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UNITED STATES OF AMERICA. 



AN 



AFFECTIONATE INVITATION 



THE HOLY COMMUNION. 

BEING SELECTIONS 

FHOM THE WORKS OF 

EMINENT ENGLISH DIVINES. 

BY 

BENJAMIN DORR, D. D. 

RECTOR OF CHRIST CHURCH, PHILADELPHIA, 
/ 

P H IL ADE LPH I A : 

R. S. H. GEORGE, 26 SOUTH FIFTH STREET. 

1843. 



^6 



?T 



Entered according to the Act of Congress, in the year 1843, 
by B. DORR, in the Clerk's office of the District Court of the 
Eastern District of Pennsylvania. 



I 



King and Baird, Printers, 
No. 9 George Street. 



ADVERTISEMENT. 



The following selections, from the writings of 
distinguished divines of the Church of England, 
are designed principally for those persons who 
are absentees from the Lord's Table ; but they 
will be found profitable and instructive, it is 
believed, to the devout communicant. The 
Editor has been induced to prepare this little 
work, w 7 ith special reference to the members of 
his own flock, over whom the Holy Ghost has 
made him a Pastor, and whom he has promised 
"to teach, and to premonish, to feed, and pro- 
vide for." He therefore affectionately solicits 
those of them who "separate from their breth- 
ren, who come to feed on the banquet of that 



IV 

most heavenly food," to give these pages an 
attentive reading, and earnestly to consider the 
truths which are here so forcibly presented ; that 
so they may, " by God's grace, return to a bet- 
ter mind." 

His fervent prayer is, and ever shall be, that 
all may come to this Holy Sacrament with true 
penitent hearts, lively faith, and universal chari- 
ty ; and daily increase in God's Holy Spirit, 
more and more, until they come unto his ever- 
lasting kingdom. 

Philadelphia, March 22, 1843. 



AN 



EXHORTATION 



TO THE 



HOLY COMMUNION 



If thou wilt enter into life, keep the Commandments 

St. Matthew, xix. 17. 



AN EXHORTATION 



TO THE 



HOLY COMMUNION 



PART I. 



The object of the following tract is to point 
out, in humble dependence on the Divine bless- 
ing, and in as plain and simple a manner as pos- 
sible, — 

I. The nature and design of the Sacrament of 
the Lord's Supper. 

II. Our obligation to attend on this Holy In- 
stitution, and our sin in neglecting it. 

III. The preparation necessary for a suitable 
partaking of it. 



O AFFECTIONATE INVITATION 

I. With respect to the nature and design of 
the Sacrament of the Lord, I would begin with 
reminding you of the time, and mode, and cir- 
cumstances of its institution. It was instituted 
by Christ himself, in the same night in which 
He was betrayed, a few hours before He was 
crucified, immediately after having eaten the 
Passover with His disciples for the last time. 
Then it was that He " took bread, and when He 
had given thanks, he brake it, and said, Take, 
eat, this is my body, which is broken for you : 
this do in remembrance of me. After the same 
manner also He took the cup, when He had 
supped, saying, This cup is the New Testament 
in my blood, this do ye, as oft as ye drink it, in 
remembrance of me.' 9 Such was the institution 
of this sacrament : and that it was designed, not 
for the Apostles only, but for the general Church 
of Christ, appears, not merely from the practice 
of the primitive Christians under the immediate 
inspection and authority of the Apostles them- 
selves, but also from the words of St. Paul di- 
rectly following those which I have just cited, 
when he says to the Corinthians, " For as often 
as ye eat this bread, and drink this cup, ye do 



TO THE HOLY COMMUNION. 9 

show the Lord's death till He come ;"* words 
which plainly intimate that this institution was 
to remain in use till the second coming of Christ, 
that is, to the end of the w>rld. 

On reading this account of the institution, 
there is one reflection which forces itself strongly 
on our minds. Whatever might be the particu- 
lar object of this institution, it was surely de- 
signed for the benefit of those for whose use 
it was prescribed. Can we suppose that our 
kind and gracious Redeemer, whose heart was 
ever full of love to His people, would appoint 
any ordinance for their use which would not be 
for their good ? Would He, especially at such 
a time, when He was on the point of suffering 
the most cruel torments, and shedding His blood 
for them, would He then enjoin on them the ob- 
servance of a ceremony, which would not be 
highly useful, highly salutary to them ? Would 
He then have said to them, "Do this" if the 
thing to be done had not been what he well 
knew that it would be, for their comfort and hap- 
piness ? I dwell the longer on this point, be- 

* 1 Cor. xi. 23, 24, 25, 26. 
1* 



10 AFFECTIONATE INVITATION 

cause it is one which directly meets the fears, 
and scruples, and apprehensions of many per- 
sons, who seem to regard this blessed institution 
with a degree of jealousy and suspicion, as if 
our merciful Saviour in appointing this ordinance 
had laid a snare by which they might be entan- 
gled and injured ; as if when He had invited 
them to eat of His bread, and drink of His wine, 
He had called them to do that, which it would 
be safer and more prudent for them to leave un- 
done. Does our Divine Redeemer deserve to 
be thus suspected by us ? Is this a suitable re- 
turn for all His tenderness and love, to tell Him, 
when He calls us to His table, that He is only 
calling us to our hurt, and that it will be better 
for us to keep away? My Brethren, have you 
ever been deterred from coming to the Sacrament 
by any apprehension of this kind ? Let me 
beseech you to have more just and honourable 
thoughts of Him, who loved you and gave himself 
for you. Instead of regarding with a groundless 
suspicion those symbols which He gives you of 
His body and blood, O receive them as pledges 
of His love, to your great and endless comfort. 
But to return to our subject. From this cir- 



TO THE HOLY COMMUNION. 11 

cumstance of our Saviour having instituted this 
Sacrament immediately after having eaten the 
Passover for the last time, it seems highly pro- 
bable that he intended this institution, under the 
Christian dispensation, to take the place of that 
ordinance in the Jewish Church. As if He had 
said, " Hitherto you have been taught to com- 
memorate the deliverance of your nation out of 
the bondage of Egypt, and their preservation 
from the sword of the destroying angel, by kill- 
ing and eating the Paschal Lamb, but this deli- 
verance, and this preservation, have always been 
typical of a greater deliverance, and a more im- 
portant preservation, even a spiritual deliverance 
from sin, and a personal preservation from ever- 
lasting punishment. These blessings are the 
purchase of my blood, which I am just about to 
shed for the sin of the world, and which has 
hitherto been represented by the blood of the 
Paschal Lamb. Henceforth you are to com- 
memorate these things in another way. The 
blood of the true sacrifice having been once actu- 
ally shed, it will not be expedient that the typi- 
cal lamb shall any longer be slain. From this 
time other representations, other symbols, are 



12 AFFECTIONATE INVITATION 

to be used. This bread which I break, repre- 
sents my body broken on the cross. Take and 
eat it in remembrance of my love and of the 
provision I have made for your souls. This 
wine represents my blood shed for your salva- 
tion. Drink it with a thankful recollection of 
the blessings and privileges which it has pur- 
chased for you. And while you thus eat of my 
body and drink of my blood, bear in mind, that 
I have appointed this way for your commemo- 
rating these things, in order that by their being 
thus represented to your outward senses, you 
may have a more lively apprehension, and a 
more devout and spiritual feeling of them in 
your hearts, and that this institution may ever 
remain as a pledge of my love, and as a seal of 
the certainty of those benefits, of which the 
sacrifice that you herein commemorate is the 
price !" 

From this scriptural statement of this institu- 
tion, surely its nature and design are sufficiently 
apparent. Can any institution be in itself more 
plain and simple ? 

I now proceed from what has been said, to 
state, — 



TO THE HOLY COMMUNION. 13 

II. Our obligation to attend on this Holy In- 
stitution, and our sin in neglecting it. 

There are many considerations which bear 
upon these points, and which, if duly attended 
to, cannot fail of making a suitable impression 
on our minds. 

Let us consider, in the first place, by Whom 
this ordinance was appointed, — Who it was that 
said, "Do this." It was Christ Himself. It was 
the Divine Author of our holy religion. It was 
He, whom we profess to believe in, to belong 
to, and to obey, — whom we acknowledge as our 
Saviour, — whom we expect to meet as our 
Judge. He it was who appointed this institu- 
tion, and has commanded all His disciples to ob- 
serve it. Has the command of Christ no weight 
with us ? Are we not bound to regard His 
authority? Can we justify our living in a con- 
stant neglect of an act which He has commanded 
us to perform? "If it were some great thing 
which we were commanded to do," some pain- 
ful, severe, laborious act of self-denial which 
Christ had enjoined, should we not do it? 
Would it not be our duty, as His servants and 
subjects, to comply with His injunctions? 



14 AFFECTIONATE INVITATION 

Could we on any ground excuse or justify dis- 
obedience ? How much rather then when He 
saith to us, Eat of this bread, and drink of this 
wine? The simplicity of the command, and 
the ease with which it may be obeyed, greatly 
increase our obligation to attend on this institu- 
tion, and our sin in neglecting it. And how can 
we call ourselves disciples of Christ if we do 
not the things which He commands ? 

Let us consider again that this injunction 
comes to us not only as a command which we 
are bound in duty to obey, but in a more en- 
gaging and interesting form, as a request with 
which we are strongly urged to comply. It is 
a request made to us by a friend, the best friend 
we ever had in the world, and that friend, a dying 
friend, dying for us, in our stead, and for our 
benefit, and with his dying breath bequeathing 
us this pledge and token of his love, and impor- 
tuning us often to make use of it for his sake. 
Can we justify the not complying with such 
a request, urged by such a person, at such 
a time, and under such circumstances ? If some 
kind and dear relation, to whose affection and 
generosity we were deeply indebted, should 



TO THE HOLY COMMUNION. 15 

leave us a ring, or a picture, or some other me- 
morial of his regard, and should request us at 
some stated times to look upon it with a grateful 
remembrance of our benefactor, should we not 
feel this to be a request with which we were 
constrained to comply? Should we not be 
ashamed, when the stated times arrived, and 
we were reminded of our duty, and the memo- 
rial itself were produced, should we not, I ask, 
be ashamed to turn our eyes another way, and 
refuse even to look upon this token of his love ? 
But, my brethren, where is the difference, if 
when invited to the table of our Lord, we should 
constantly turn our back on this sacred ordi- 
nance, and refuse to partake of these pledges of 
His dying love ? Ought we not to feel shame 
at showing such ingratitude, such want of proper 
feeling towards our gracious benefactor ? With 
what comfort or confidence can we hope to meet 
Him at His coming, if we now habitually ne- 
glect to meet Him at His Table ? Rather, shall 
we not he covered w r ith confusion of face, when 
He shall reproachfully inquire of us, " Was this 
your love to your friend ? Was this your grati- 
tude for the blessings of redeeming mercy ? You 



16 AFFECTIONATE INVITATION 

would not even bear me in remembrance, though 
I appointed you the means of doing it, and urged 
you to make use of them." 

Let us consider, in the third place, that by ab- 
senting ourselves from the Lord's Table, we 
seem, in a manner, to deny Him, and to intimate 
that we do not really belong to Him. Commu- 
nion with Him in the ordinances of his own ap- 
pointing, is a sign and a badge of our attachment 
and relation to Him. By what mark is the 
Christian peculiarly distinguished, but by his 
profession of faith and hope in Jesus Christ? 
At baptism he takes upon himself this profes- 
sion, and he is signed with the sign of the Cross 
in token that he shall not hereafter be ashamed 
to confess the faith of Christ crucified. But if 
he regularly turn his back on the Holy Commu- 
nion, does it not seem as if he were ashamed to 
confess this faith ? If he acts in the same man- 
ner as they do who profess no faith in Christ, 
how does he show the difference between him- 
self and them ? If whenever a commander 
should raise his standard, and expect his soldiers 
to muster around it, any who had been enlisted 
under his banner should constantly decline at- 



TO THE HOLY COMMUNION. 17 

tending, and instead of joining the leader whom 
they professed to obey, should be seen at that 
very time among the ranks of his enemies and 
opposers, what opinion should we form of the 
fidelity and loyalty of such persons ? or by what 
proof could they convince us that they were 
really attached, and wished well to the cause of 
Him, whom they thus openly disowned ? Chris- 
tians are to show that they belong to Christ, and 
that all their hope is in Him, and they are to 
show this in the face of the world. But how 
do they show this, if, when bidden to His Sup- 
per, with one consent they make excuse, and re- 
fuse to come ? My brethren, when you have 
been going out of the church on a Sacrament 
Sunday, has your conscience never smitten you 
with the thought that you were fleeing from your 
post, and deserting the colours under which you 
had engaged manfully to fight? Have you 
never heard a voice in your ears, saying, " Will 
ye also go away ?" 

Let us consider, in the fourth place, the loss 

which we are sustaining, and the injury which 

we are doing to our own souls, by not frequenting 

the Holy Communion. That it is an institution 

2 



18 AFFECTIONATE INVITATION 

designed for the benefit of those who partake of 
it, we have already seen, and that it does really 
prove a blessing to those who rightly partake of 
it, we cannot doubt, when we reflect on the 
power and character of Him who appointed it. 
As an act of faith and obedience when performed 
as such, and accompanied with a grateful recol- 
lection of the mercies and promises of the Gos- 
pel, it must have a very salutary and beneficial 
effect on all who are engaged in it. The very 
circumstance of having the pledges of our Sa- 
viour's love, and the emblems of his body and 
blood, literally placed before our eyes, sensibly 
reminding us of His grace and mercy, of His 
death and sacrifice, and visibly assuring us of the 
truth and certainty of all that He hath done and 
suffered for our salvation, cannot but have a very 
strong tendency to increase our faith and confi- 
dence in Him, and to strengthen our resolutions 
of henceforth living more faithfully and closely 
to Him. Numbers of living Christians can tes- 
tify to the peace and consolation, and even joy, 
which they have thus felt, while partaking of 
this heavenly feast, and can declare how deeply 
their hearts have been affected, and their souls 



TO THE HOLY COMMUNION. 19 

strengthened and refreshed, at this sacred ordi- 
nance. Besides, every exercise of faith is an 
act of communion with Christ. It is by faith 
that a union with Him first is formed. It is by 
the same faith that it is afterwards maintained ; 
and while we ascend to Christ in faith, He de- 
scends to us by His Spirit, and thus we have 
fellowship with Him and with the Father. But 
to partake of this Holy Sacrament is an especial 
act and exercise of faith, and, consequently, es- 
pecial communications of the Spirit may be rea- 
sonably expected to accompany it. If Christ 
delights to meet and make glad His people in 
His ordinances, in what ordinance may they so 
certainly hope that He will visit and refesh them, 
will impart to them spiritual blessings, and make 
them glad with the light of His countenance, as 
in that ordinance which He has especially ap- 
pointed them to use for the express purpose of 
remembering Him and the blessings which He 
has purchased for them, for testifying their faith 
in Him, and for solemnly renewing, as it were, 
their covenant with Him ? But all these benefits 
we are voluntarily losing by absenting ourselves 
from this Holy Communion. Neglecting the 



20 AFFECTIONATE INVITATION 

Lord's table, we are forsaking our own mercies. 
We are criminally depriving our souls of that 
spiritual food and sustenance which is provided 
for them, and consequently of spiritual health, 
and growth, and strength, which cannot but be 
sensibly affected by such a privation. I come 
now to speak, — 

III. Of the Preparation necessary for a suita- 
ble partaking of the Lord's Supper. 

By this Preparation I do not mean any parti- 
cular mode or course of preparation which is to 
be performed previously to the act of communi- 
cating : of such performances, the best thing I 
can say, is, that they are good or evil according 
as they are used, and according to the effects 
which they produce. If persons find that by 
any prescribed course of reading and religious 
exercises before they come to the Sacrament, a 
spirit of real devotion, of humility, piety, and 
charity is promoted in them, — then let them use 
such means so far as they have time and oppor- 
tunity. But if, on the contrary, the prescribed 
course in question is resorted to merely as a 
formal, superstitious service, (as, for instance, 
when persons will excuse themselves from 



TO THE HOLY COMMUNION. 21 

coming to the Sacrament on the alleged plea, 
that they have not had time to go through their 
Week's Preparation,) and if thus the use of it 
tends merely to foster a self-righteous, pharisa- 
ical spirit, — then it is plain that in such cases a 
prescribed course of preparation is evil, and does 
mischief instead of good. 

The Preparation of which I am speaking, is 
the preparation of the heart; that state of heart 
which the true Christian habitually possesses, 
which does not consist in mere feelings, and 
which qualifies him at any time for a profitable 
partaking of the Lord's Supper. Are persons 
really humbled under a sense of their sins, of 
their sinful nature, and sinful life ? Do they 
sincerely desire to be freed from the punishment, 
the practice, and the pollution of sin 'i Do they 
look to Jesus Christ as the only sacrifice for sin, 
by whose blood alone their sin can be washed 
away, and their soul cleansed ? Do they enter- 
tain a devout and thankful remembrance of what 
He has done and suffered for them 1 Do they 
desire, and through His grace resolve, to resist 
the Devil, the world, and the flesh, and to lead a 
righteous, sober, and godly life, a life of faith in 
2* 



22 AFFECTIONATE INVITATION 

Jesus Christ, and of obedience to His holy 
will? If such be their permanent convictions, 
desires, and resolutions, they have that prepara- 
tion of heart of which I speak, and with 
which they may partake, and ought to partake 
of the Holy Communion, whenever an op- 
portunity may offer. Should persons, while 
such is the habitual state of their heart, be sur- 
prised, as the Virgins were, while they slumber 
and sleep, with a summons to the marriage sup- 
per, they should not on that account decline the 
invitation, and exclude themselves. Having oil 
in their vessels, they should trim their lamps as 
speedily as they can, and hasten to partake of 
the feast, though of course, if a longer notice be 
given them, they will take the opportunity of 
more closely inspecting their wedding garment, 
and of more studiously seeking to have their 
soul in that condition which will best qualify it 
for meeting their Lord, and for enjoying the pro- 
visions of His Table. 

On the subject of Preparation, indeed, there is 
one excuse so very generally urged against coming 
to the Lord's Supper, that I feel it necessary to 
give to it a distinct and prominent notice. When 



TO THE HOLY COMMUNION. 23 

invited to communicate, persons justify a refusal, 
either openly or secretly, upon the ground of 
their unworthiness : " We cannot approach the 
Lord's Table, for we have no fitness for it; we 
are univorthy" 

Now, my Brethren, if the person who pleads 
this excuse, really pleads it under a deep feeling 
of genuine humility ; if he is so truly sensible of 
the burden and defiling nature of his sins as to 
condemn himself on account of them, and with 
the humble publican to stand afar off, and to cry 
for mercy, I can only say, that of all persons in 
the world, such a one is most fitted to draw near 
with faith, and to take this Holy Sacrament to 
his comfort. For whom are the blessings of the 
Gospel provided ? To whom are its promises 
addressed ? Is it not to the contrite in heart, the 
poor in spirit, the mourners for sin, those who 
hunger and thirst after righteousness ? Are not 
these the persons to whom the invitations of the 
Gospel are sent, and who are pressed, and urged, 
and in a manner compelled to accept them? 
And what is the Sacrament of the Lord's Supper 
but an exhibition of the grace and riches of the 
Gospel ? And who are the persons that are 



24 AFFECTIONATE INVITATION 

welcome there, but the very persons whom the 
Gospel calls ? To every one then who answers 
this description, to every one whose conscience 
is tender, whose faith is weak, whose fears are 
great, I would freely say, "Lay aside your 
doubts. It is for such as you that this Table is 
prepared. Fear not. Talk not of your unwor- 
thiness. Only be willing ; only believe ; only 
come. You will be a welcome guest, and a 
meet partaker of those holy mysteries. The 
Lord hath already prepared your heart. O turn 
not away from the feast which he has provided 
for you." 

If, however, those who plead their own un- 
worthiness urge this plea, on the supposition 
that they must bring with them to the Table of 
the Lord some worthiness of their own, which 
will give them a claim, — something belonging 
to themselves, which will make them worthy 
guests at His Table, — I must tell such plainly, 
that they know not the first principles of Chris- 
tianity. No man can ever have any such wor- 
thiness. If any one thinks that he has or can 
have any thing of this kind, he is vainly puffed 
up in his fleshly mind, and knoweth nothing as 



TO THE HOLY COMMUNION. 25 

he ought to know. My Brethren, what you 
ought to bring with you is a broken and a con- 
trite heart. Pray to God to give you this. Re- 
nounce your own righteousness. Trust only in 
the great and manifold mercies of the Lord. 
Draw near to Him with a humble spirit, and He 
will in no wise cast you out. 

But those, who use this plea of unworthiness^ 
have sometimes another meaning. Conscious 
that they are living in the allowed indulgence of 
some sinful practices, or some unchristian tem- 
pers, which they have at present no intention to 
discontinue and subdue, they know that they are 
not Jit for communicating at the Lord's Table. 
They have light enough to see that a course of 
sin is incompatible with receiving the Sacrament, 
but they have not grace enough to break off from 
their sinful courses. They are determined to 
continue in them, and therefore, they plead, that 
they are not Jit to receive the Sacrament. And 
they plead aright. They are not Jit for this 
sacred ordinance. And for what religious duty 
are such persons Jit? Are they Jit to join in 
the service of the Church? Can they take a 
part in its confessions, petitions, and thanks 



26 AFFECTIONATE INVITATION 

givings ? Are they fit to say the Lord's Prayer ? 
Can they say to God, " Our Father?" No ! 
The Devil is their father ; for by their own con- 
fession they are workers of iniquity, and, conse- 
quently, children of the Devil. O, my Breth- 
ren, if there should.be any of you, whose hearts 
at this moment tell you that this is your present 
state, think, I beseech you, how awful and 
perilous it is. Acknowledging yourselves unfit 
to come to the blessed Saviour of sinners for 
pardon and life, are you fit to die ? You know 
that you are not fit to die. You intend to repent 
hereafter, but you will not do it now. Now you 
will go on in sin against light and knowledge, 
against conscience and conviction. Now, when 
invited to Christ you will refuse to come. O 
beware, lest when you may desire to come, you 
find the door shut against you ! u Now is the ac- 
cepted time ; now is the day of salvation." 
May the Lord in His mercy grant you repent- 
ance unto the acknowledging of the truth, that 
you may recover yourselves out of the snare of 
the Devil, who are thus taken captive by him at 
his will ! 



TO THE HOLY COMMUNION. 27 



PART IL 

It shall now be my endeavour to remove a 
stumbling-block, which has often stood in the 
way of many devout and serious persons, who 
have otherwise been disposed to attend at the 
Table of their Lord. The. obstacle to which I 
allude arises from the introduction of certain ex- 
pressions into the Communion Service of our 
Church, which, taken in their plain and most 
obvious sense, seem to convey a meaning differ- 
ent from that which they are intended to convey. 
The minister, in the exhortation which at the 
time of celebrating the Holy Communion he ad- 
dresses to the congregation, is directed to remind 
them, that " as the benefit is great, if with a true 
penitent heart and lively faith we receive that 
Holy Sacrament, so is the danger great, if we 
receive the same univorthily. For then we are 
guilty of the body and blood of Christ our Sa- 
viour ; we eat and drink our own damnation, 
not considering the LoroVs body/ 9 



28 AFFECTIONATE INVITATION 

These are the expressions in question; ex- 
pressions which certainly, at first sight, assume 
a formidable appearance, and which, if interpret- 
ed according to the sound alone, may readily 
prove a stumbling-block to many sincere, but 
weak and uninstructed Christians. Let me then 
observe to you, in the first place, that these are 
scriptural expressions, and are taken from the 
eleventh chapter of St. Paul's first Epistle to the 
Corinthians, in which he is speaking so much at 
large on the subject of this Sacrament. In en- 
deavouring, therefore, to obviate any occasion of 
stumbling which they may furnish, I will show 
you, first their original signification as they are 
used by the Apostle, and, secondly, their mean- 
ing as they are introduced into the Service of 
our Church. 

First, St. Paul having given an account of 
the institution of this Sacrament, and having said 
to the Corinthians, " As often as ye eat this 
bread, and drink this cup, ye do show the Lord's 
death till he come," immediately adds, " Where- 
fore, whosoever shall eat this bread, and drink 
this cup of the Lord unworthily, shall be guilty 
of the body and blood of the Lord;" and again, 



TO THE HOLY COMMUNION. 29 

in a verse after, he proceeds, " for he that eateth 
and drinketh unworthily, eateth and drinketh 
damnation to himself, not discerning the Lord's 
body." The first thing to be inquired into for 
the understanding of these expressions, is the 
meaning of the term " eating and drinking un- 
worthily ," and for this purpose we must advert 
to the particular circumstance in the Corinthian 
Church, which, in reference to this subject, the 
Apostle in this chapter notices. 

We there find, to our great surprise, that the 
Corinthians, (some of them, at least, for we can- 
not suppose that the whole body of the Chris- 
tians at Corinth were equally guilty in this re- 
spect,) in their celebration of the Holy Commu- 
nion, conducted themselves in such a manner, as 
to incur the severe reproof of the Apostle. 
" When ye come together," says he, at the 20th 
verse of the chapter, "into one place, this is 
not to eat the Lord's Supper." The way in 
which they kept this institution was so contrary 
to the design of it, so different from the way in 
which they ought to have kept it, and even so 
scandalous in itself, that they could not be cor- 
rectly said to keep it at all. Their eating was 
3 



30 AFFECTIONATE INVITATION 

not eating the Lord's Supper. In fact, they 
made a common meal of this sacred ordinance, 
nay, they actually turned it into an occasion of 
sensuality and carnal indulgence. Observe the 
Apostle's words : " For in eating, every one 
taketh before other his own supper: and one is 
hungry, and another is drunken. What! have 
ye not houses to eat and drink in ? Or despise 
ye the Church of God, and shame them that 
have not? What shall I say to you ? Shall I 
praise you in this ? I praise you not." When, 
after having thus animadverted on their disor- 
derly conduct, we find the Apostle immediately 
stating, by way of contrast, the pure, simple de- 
sign, and holy tendency of this institution, and 
then proceeding in these words, " Wherefore, 
whosoever shall eat this bread, and drink this 
cup unworthily" — it is obvious that he uses 
this word unworthily in reference to the disor- 
derly and shameful conduct, on which he had 
been animadverting. The manner in which the 
Corinthians had behaved at the Lord's Table 
was most unworthy of the institution, and they 
who had thus eaten and drunken of it, had eaten 
and drunken unworthily. They had profaned 



TO THE HOLY COMMUNION* 31 

this sacred ordinance by their indecent and irre- 
verent behaviour, " not discerning," as St. Paul 
says, "the Lord's body;" that is, not distin- 
guishing between this heavenly feast, and a com- 
mon entertainment; — not observing the due and 
respectful distinction which there was between 
the Sacramental Supper, which Christ had ap- 
pointed for the spiritual benefit of His people, 
and an ordinary meal in their own houses. This 
is clearly what St. Paul here means by the term, 
eating and drinking unworthily. It is eating 
and drinking the blessed pledges of redeeming 
love in a riotous and disorderly manner ; for 
such had been the way in which the Corinthi- 
ans, whom he is censuring, had eaten and drunk. 
And thus, he goes on to say, they were "guilty 
of the body and blood of Christ" and " did 
eat and drink their own damnation" These 
are the terms which require to be next ex- 
plained. 

To be guilty of the body and blood of the 
Lord, means to be guilty of profaning them, — 
to be chargeable with treating them contemptu- 
ously, — and so with a measure of the same guilt 
which they incurred, who nailed His sacred 



32 AFFECTIONATE INVITATION 

body, and shed His precious blood on the cross. 
So that, in fact, by thus eating and drinking un- 
worthily, they ate and drank their own damna- 
tion. By attending on this sacred ordinance in 
the manner described, they had exposed them- 
selves to the Divine wrath and punishment. No 
doubt this was the case. By such a profane abuse 
of holy things they had committed a sin, of 
which, as of every other sin, the wages were 
death. But there is no intimation whatever, 
that the Apostle considered this sin as unpardon- 
able, as an offence, however great, of which 
they might not savingly repent. The very con- 
trary, indeed, is implied throughout the whole 
passage ; and even the persons who had been 
guilty of this great indecency are exhorted to 
" examine themselves, and so to eat of that 
bread, and drink of that cup." In fact, much of 
the difficulty of the passage, and the trouble 
which it gives to tender minds, lies in the word 
Damnation, a sense, which the original word 
often bears, but which it need not necessarily 
bear. It is frequently rendered " Condemna- 
tion" a word of less formidable sound, and still 
more frequently "Judgment" the very word 



TO THE HOLY COMMUNION. 33 

which is here put by onr translators in the mar- 
gin of the Bible, and which, perhaps, in this 
place would have better conveyed the meaning 
of the Apostle ; for it is plain, as the whole con- 
necting passage obviously shows, that by this 
word Saint Paul intended chiefly to describe 
those temporal punishments and corrections to 
which the Corinthians had by their misconduct 
exposed themselves. What does he immediately 
add? — " For this cause many are weak and 
sickly among you, and many sleep." God had 
punished their profaneness and presumption by 
afflicting them with divers diseases, of which 
some had died. The design of these judgments, 
as the Apostle expressly says, was to benefit 
those who were afflicted with them, that by ex- 
amining and condemning themselves for their 
sinful conduct, they might escape a heavier con- 
demnation. " For if (says he) we would judge 
ourselves, we should not be judged. But when 
we are judged, we are chastened of the Lord, 
that we may not be condemned with the world." 
I hope that, from this explanation, the expres- 
sions in the passage where they stand, may be 
clearly understood. I hope it plainly appears 
3* 



34 AFFECTIONATE INVITATION 

that the Corinthians, by the irreverent and disor- 
derly manner in which they had come to the 
Lord's Table, and had behaved themselves there, 
had contracted a degree of guilt, which called for 
very deep repentance, and of which, unless they 
did repent, they might expect to be visited with 
severe corrections. Let us now see, — 

Secondly, the meaning of these expressions, 
as they are introduced into the Service of our 
Church. 

And here let me begin with remarking, that 
these expressions cannot have in this place ex- 
actly the same meaning which they have in 
Scripture. The compilers of our Liturgy could 
never have supposed that any persons in the 
communion of our Church, would ever be guilty 
of conduct precisely resembling that of the Co- 
rinthians,— that they would literally make a 
common meal of the Lord's Supper, and drink 
to excess at His Table. The prescribed mode 
of communicating, the order, the discipline, and 
all the circumstances of the celebration of this 
ordinance in our Church, exclude the probabi- 
lity, I might say the possibility, of such things 
occurring among us. Persons cannot in this 



TO THE HOLY COMMUNION. 35 

way eat and drink unworthily in onr Churches, 
nor, consequently, so eat and drink their own 
condemnation. 

It is plain, then, that this expression of " eat- 
ing and drinking unworthily," when introduced 
into the Service of our Church, can only be 
used to denote some offence resembling that of 
which the Corinthians were guilty. It can only 
refer to our acting under onr circumstances, in 
the same spirit in which they acted under 
theirs. They showed a very profane, irreve- 
rent spirit in their manner of coming to the 
Lord's Table. Thus the exhortation given to 
us warns us against coming in the same spirit. 
It warns us to beware of provoking God by 
coming to this sacred ordinance with a light, 
careless, carnal, sensual mind. It exhorts us, 
on the contrary, to draw near with reverence and 
godly fear, in a sober, serious, and humble spirit, 
equally removed from a superstitious dread on 
the one hand, and from a presumptuous indiffer- 
ence on the other ; while it admonishes us, from 
a reference to the example of the Corinthian 
Church, that we must stand in awe and sin not ; 
that God is greatly to be feared in the assembly 



36 AFFECTIONATE INVITATION 

of His Saints, and to be had in reverence of all 
them that are around about Him ; that if we 
judge ourselves we shall not be judged of the 
Lord ; and that if He does chasten His people 
in this world, it is that they may not be con- 
demned with the world. 

And now, my Brethren, have I succeeded in 
taking this stumbling-block out of your path ? 
Have I succeeded in showing you, that you have 
nothing really to fear from these expressions in 
the Service of our Church? You, I mean, (for 
it is to you I am speaking.) who may hitherto 
have felt some apprehension on this subject; 
who have been afraid lest you might possibly 
eat and drink unworthily, and so might be guilty 
of the body and blood of the Lord, and eat and 
drink your own damnation. I trust you now 
see that such an apprehension is groundless. 
Your very apprehension, indeed, on the subject 
renders it, if I may so speak, impossible that 
you can do these things. The very fear which 
you have of doing them utterly precludes you 
from doing them. They who can do such 
things, can have no fear of this kind, otherwise 
they would not do them. Let me ask you, 



TO THE HOLY COMMUNION. 37 

could you come boldly, carelessly, presumptu- 
ously, fearlessly, to the Lord's Table ? No ; 
you dread nothing so much as coming in this 
way. But perhaps you may say, " I long, in- 
deed, to partake of this sacred ordinance with a 
humble, serious, and devout mind, but I am 
afraid that my mind is not so humble, serious, 
and devout as it ought to be. And thus, if I 
should go at last unworthily, what will become 
of me ?" Let me beseech you to lay aside such 
thoughts. You cannot go unworthily, while 
such are your desires and fears. As to your not 
being as humble, serious, and devout as you 
ought to be, that is a thing which cannot be 
otherwise. Paul himself would have made the 
same confession. I repeat what I have already 
said (and may it come with power and consola- 
tion to your soul), so long as you desire to be a 
humble, devout, and serious communicant, you 
cannot come unworthily; you have nothing to fear 
from those expressions which may have hitherto 
caused you uneasiness. You cannot offend as 
the Corinthians offended. You cannot act in 
their spirit. You need not be afraid of their 
judgments. 



38 AFFECTIONATE INVITATION 

But, perhaps, it may be asked, Are there no 
persons, then, who eat and drink unworthily? 
who are guilty of the body and blood of the 
Lord, and eat and drink their own damnation ? 
Yes, my Brethren, it is to be feared that there 
may still be such persons ; persons who, with a 
profane and sensual heart, presume to eat of that 
bread and drink of that cup ; persons who, with- 
out any repentance for sin, or any faith in the 
Saviour, fearlessly come to His Table ; persons 
who, retaining an unforgiving and malignant 
temper, intrude into this feast of holy love ; per- 
sons who, having no other motive for partaking 
of this Sacrament than a desire to please some 
worldly friend, profanely thrust themselves into 
these sacred mysteries. 

Such persons, it is to be feared, there still are 
in the Christian world ; persons who, having 
nothing Christian about them but the name, do 
yet attend this Christian ordinance, and eat and 
drink the pledges of the Saviour's love. And 
such persons do unquestionably eat and drink 
unworthily. They profane and pervert this 
holy institution, and eat and drink to their own 
condemnation. 



TO THE HOLY COMMUNION. 39 

But let us remember, that it is not in reference 
to this Sacrament alone that they act thus ; they 
act thus in every thing. What is there which 
such persons do not to their own condemnation ? 
My Brethren, let us come to a right understand- 
ing on this matter. A profane, wicked, ungodly 
person, in every thing which he does, must in- 
crease his sin and guilt. Does he come to the 
public worship of God ? He comes to his own 
condemnation ; for every thing which he hears 
there will rise up in judgment against him, and 
condemn him. Does he stay away from the 
House of God? He stays away to his own 
condemnation, for he is despising God and His 
ordinances. Does he utter a prayer in his own 
house? He utters it to his own condemnation, 
for he utters it formally and hypocritically, and 
without the heart. Does he live without prayer? 
He so lives to his own condemnation, for he 
lives without God in the world. In a word, 
such a man, continuing such, can do nothing but 
treasure up wrath against the day of wrath. For 
we are expressly told in the Word of God, that 
the " sacrifice of the wicked is an abomination 
to the Lord." Where, then, is the wonder, that 



40 AFFECTIONATE INVITATION 

if such persons presume to eat and drink at the 
Lord's Table, they should eat and drink con- 
demnation to themselves ? How can it be other- 
wise ? Until they truly repent, and do works 
meet for repentance- — until they flee with peni- 
tent hearts to the Saviour of sinners for the par- 
don of their sins, and for the gift of a new and 
holy heart, — there is, there can be, no hope for 
them. They are destitute of every thing which 
can fit them for serving God here, and for dwell- 
ing with Him hereafter. Blessed indeed be the 
riches of His grace ; if they did but feel their 
need, they might soon obtain a full supply for 
all their wants. Jesus is ready to receive, to 
pardon, and to bless every soul that turns to 
Him, even the chief of sinners. And in His 
name I would bid all to turn to Him. I would as- 
sure all who do with the heart turn to Him, that 
they shall be gTaciously received and welcomed. 
I would say to the wicked, " Forsake your way, 
and turn unto the Lord, for He will have mercy 
upon you, and to your God, for He will abun- 
dantly pardon." 

And if I have authority from the Word of 
God to say these things to the wicked, to those 



TO THE HOLY COMMUNION. 41 

whose hearts at present are hard and impeni- 
tent, — if I am permitted to assure such persons 
that there is mercy and pardon even for them, if 
they will but seek it, that God is not willing 
that they should perish, but waiteth to be gra- 
cious unto them, — what may I not say to you, 
my Brethren, who are of a contrite and a hum- 
ble spirit, and who tremble at His holy word ? 
What consolation, what encouragement may I 
not give to you? I can assure you, from the 
word of the Lord, that He looketh upon you, 
yea, with favour and delight. I can say unto 
you in His name, and in His own words, " Fear 
thou not, for I am with thee : be not dismayed, 
for I am thy God. I will strengthen thee ; yea, 
I will uphold thee, with the right hand of my 
righteousness." 

4 



THE LORD'S SUPPER. 

My God, and is thy table spread, 

And does thy cup with love o'erflow 1 

Thither be all thy children led, 

And let them thy sweet mercies know. 

Hail, sacred feast, which Jesus makes, 
Rich banquet of his flesh and blood ; 

Thrice happy he who here partakes 
That sacred stream, that heavenly food. 

Why are its bounties all in vain 
Before unwilling hearts display'd 1 

Was not for you the victim slain 1 
Are you forbid the children's bread 1 

O let Thy table honoured be, 

And furnish'd well with joyful guests; 
And may each soul salvation see, 

That here its holy pledges tastes. 

Drawn by Thy quickening grace, O Lord, 
In countless numbers let them come ; 

And gather, from their Father's board, 
The bread that lives beyond the tomb. 

Nor let Thy spreading Gospel rest, 

Till through the world Thy truth has run ; 

Till with this bread all men be blest, 
Who see the light, or feel the sun. 



WHY 
ARE YOU NOT 

A COMMUNICANT? 



REV. JAMES DUKE COLERIDGE, L. L. D. 



I dare say, that he who, with an honest 
meaning, (although with an imperfect 
devotion,) doth address himself to the 
performance of this duty, is far more ex- 
cusable than he that, upon whatever 
score, declineth it. Dr. Isaac Barrow. 



WHY ARE YOU NOT A COMMUNICANT? 



As one of the flock committed to my care, I 
hope that you will suffer a word of friendly ad- 
monition from me without taking any offence ; 
for God does know that I mean only your good, 
in what I am about to say. You well know, in- 
deed, that whether my advice be regarded or not, 
it is still my duty, in a seasonable manner, to 
offer it : and that it is at the peril of my own 
soul, if fear or negligence keep me from remind- 
ing of their religious duties, any of those who 
are entrusted to me, who seem to be forgetful of 
them ; all such, whether they will hear, or whe- 
ther they will forbear, must be compelled to 
know that a minister of the Gospel is among 
them. 

Such then is my authority for addressing you, 
4*, 



46 AFFECTIONATE INVITATION 

and I would in the kindest spirit express my 
regret and sorrow at never having seen you at 
the Lord's Supper. 

Now, as a believer in Christ, you must know 
that it is your duty and your interest to do what 
He commands : and having read or heard the 
Scriptures, you must have read or heard that He 
did, on the night before He shed his blood on the 
cross, for us men and for our salvation, command 
all Christians to the end of time, to eat bread and 
drink wine at his table, in remembrance of Him.* 
You have, moreover, children, or servants, or 
both, under your care, and are bound to consider 
the effect of your example on them — whether 
they will be likely to respect Christ and his or- 
dinances, if they see their parents, or masters 
and mistresses, constantly neglect them. God, 
be assured, expects you to take some care of 
their souls as well as their bodies ; and an ac- 
count must one day be given, — it may be some 
years first, or it may be very soon ; but as sure 
as God is true, so surely must every one of us 
give an account of himself to Him ; and as your 

* Luke xxii. 19. 



TO THE HOLY COMMUNION. 47 

minister will be examined as to his discharge of 
his pastoral duties, so will heads of families be 
asked how they have done theirs to their child- 
ren and servants ; and remember, example is 
stronger than precept. 

Let me, then, ask you, why is it that you 
have never yet obeyed your Saviour's dying 
command? Is it because you think yourself 
unfit, unprepared, to perform so sacred a duty ? 
Then let me entreat you to consider in what a 
right preparation consists ; and not to forget, that 
whatever that may be, the same preparation 
must be made before you can hope to die in 
peace. After reflecting on what I read or learn 
from Scripture on this subject, I believe, and, 
therefore, declare to you, that he who has such 
a faith in his Saviour's merits, and such a grati- 
tude for what he has done for his soul, as leads 
him to repent of his past sins, and heartily to 
purpose to amend his life, at the same time for- 
giving from his heart all who may have injured 
him ; I believe that a person so disposed, may, 
safely and profitably for his soul, attend the 
Holy Communion, even though he may have 
been a great sinner before, and is, as we all 



48 AFFECTIONATE INVITATION 

know, liable to commit sin again. And it is this 
very liability to sin, that makes it so much his 
duty and interest to attend this blessed ordinance ; 
for has not the Saviour said, " Them that come 
unto me I will in no wise cast out?" And 
where can the repentant sinner draw so near to 
his Saviour, as in that Sacrament of which He 
Himself said, " Take, ^at, this is my body, 
which is given for you : do this in remembrance 
of me. Drink ye all of this, for this is my blood 
of the New Testament, which is shed for you, 
and for many, for the forgiveness of sins. Do 
this as oft as ye drink it in remembrance of me." 
For what, let me ask you, did our Lord shed his 
blood? As a propitiation for the sins of the 
whole world. For whom, then, did He appoint 
this Sacrament, in which his death is so afFect- 
ingly brought to our recollection? Not for 
saints, surely, but for sinners, those very sinners 
whom he came to save. And why did He ap- 
point it for sinners ? As an ordinance in which 
they, when penitent and believing, may have 
the pardon of their past sins sealed to them, and 
the grace of His Holy Spirit vouchsafed to help 
and support them in their Christian progress in 



TO THE HOLY COMMUNION. 49 

future, in the words of the Catechism — as a 
means of strengthening and refreshing their 
souls. 

A worthy partaker in the Lord's Supper can- 
not mean a person without sin ; for if so, no 
person that ever yet lived, or that shall in future 
live in this world (the Holy Saviour alone ex- 
cepted,) could partake : but Christ, who knew 
what was in man, his weakness and sinfulness, 
declared that all his followers, imperfect as they 
were, if conscientious and sincere, were to eat 
and drink in this Sacrament, and to show forth 
His death till He came again to judgment. So 
that, as our Saviour certainly never meant to ap- 
point an ordinance which no one should attend, 
it follows that sinners are they who must attend : 
but then they must be sinners resolving to leave 
off their sins, and, therefore, approaching God's 
table of mercy to obtain grace, and to find help 
in their time of need. There is a great differ- 
ence between being worthy to receive the bene- 
fits of the Lord's Supper, and receiving them 
after a worthy manner. The first we can never 
be, any more than we can deserve the least of 
God's mercies ; and for a man to account him- 



50 AFFECTIONATE INVITATION 

self worthy of the Divine love and pardon, would 
be far more like the self-righteous Pharisee, than 
the humble and, therefore, justified Publican. 
But the last we may do, provided that we repent 
of our sins, heartily purpose to amend our lives, 
and rest our whole faith in the sacrifice of Christ 
for the Divine acceptance of our imperfect en- 
deavours. Let me implore you, then, not any 
longer to think you are acting a safe and right 
part in absenting yourself from the Holy Com- 
munion, an account of your unfitness. Your 
Saviour and your Judge calls you to this duty ; 
the preparation necessary is only that which you 
must make if you desire to have a good hope in 
death : and to neglect the call of Christ, lest you 
should obey it in an imperfect manner, is, surely, 
to commit one sin in order to avoid the chance 
of committing another. This is, in fact, mock- 
ing God, by making your conscience the pre- 
tence for disobeying Him. 

I will ask you, then, again, why do you not 
come to the Lord's Table ? Is it because you 
are so busily engaged in worldly affairs, in pro- 
viding for your family, that you have no time to 
attend to your religious duties, and to prepare for 



TO THE HOLY COMMUNION. 51 

this most solemn and necessary one of all ?— 
How is this? Are you called on by Christ to 
neglect your daily business and labour in order 
to serve Him acceptably ? Are farmers required 
to neglect their farms, or shopkeepers their trade, 
or labourers their masters' work, before they 
can duly attend the Lord's Supper? Did the 
Saviour appoint this feast of love only for those 
who have nothing to do but to read, and pray, 
and meditate ? or does the Holy Spirit in Scrip- 
ture any where encourage idleness in our worldly 
calling, under the notion that we can only, or 
better, thereby be properly vigilant in our spi- 
ritual one ? — Far otherwise. Hear the Divine 
Word : " If any man will not work, neither let 
him eat." " That ye study to be quiet, and to 
do your own business, and to work with your 
own hands, as we commanded you." And the 
Scripture, generally, so far from forbidding the 
due discharge of the duties of your calling, di- 
rects how they are to be performed so as to 
please God, viz., by doing every thing in a reli- 
gious spirit, so that, whether eating or drinking, 
things apparently the farthest removed from a 
religious character, all may be done to the glory 



52 AFFECTIONATE INVITATION 

of God. Our Saviour, we are sure, never in- 
tended the concerns of this world to be at a 
stand, and every thing thrown into confusion ; 
which would be the case if men did not labour 
in their several callings. He charges men on 
the contrary, " not to be slothful in business," 
yet at the same time they must be "fervent in 
spirit, serving the Lord." His kingdom and his 
righteousness must first be sought and attended 
to, and this may be done without neglecting 
your duty in that state of life in which God has 
placed you. And I know no preparation for the 
Holy Communion more suitable or more ac- 
ceptable than the daily discharge of that duty in 
a religious temper and spirit, as "unto the Lord 
and not unto man :" for when so performed, re- 
ligion will be mixed up with it: while you are 
attending to the concerns of this world, you will 
be at the same time preparing for another; and 
you cannot prepare for heaven without being 
fit to attend the Lord's Supper. If, indeed, you 
allow the concerns of this world so entirely to 
engross your attention as to leave no room for 
God or religion in all your thoughts, you are 
guilty of a great sin ; you are continually for- 



TO THE HOLY COMMUNION. 53 

getting your Maker and Preserver, and whether 
you attend the Communion or not, are preparing 
for yourself that punishment which is promised 
to such persons in Psalm ix. 17. The business 
itself must be lessened, if you cannot otherwise 
lessen your eagerness in attending it. But this 
is not necessary : for I deny that either you, or 
any of those in my flock, who refuse to attend 
the Lord's Supper, have any need to be so en- 
tirely taken up with the duties of their calling as 
not to be able to take care of their souls at the 
same time, and, as one principal proof of their 
doing so, to obey their Saviour's command in 
this instance. Look round on your fellow pa- 
rishioners, and ask yourself, whether many of 
those who are mindful of their duty in this re- 
spect, have not full as good a right to plead 
worldly business as an excuse for neglect as you 
have ? 

Do not, then, deceive yourself in this manner ; 
for though "it is an easy matter for a man to 
say, I will not communicate, because I am other- 
wise hindered with worldly business ; yet such 
excuses are not so easily accepted and allowed 
before God. They that refused the feast in the 
5 



54 AFFECTIONATE INVITATION 

Gospel (in St. Matthew, chapter xx.) because 
they had bought a farm, or would try their 
yokes of oxen, or because they were married, 
were not so excused, but counted unworthy of 
the heavenly feast." Six days, then, let the 
farmer or the husbandman industriously labour 
in his proper calling ; but let him be mindful, at 
the same time, and walk worthy of that higher 
vocation wherewith he is called, the calling of 
a Christian, knowing that God sees him in all 
his thoughts, words, and works, that a Saviour 
died in order to save him, and yet who will not 
save him, if he persists in neglecting and dis- 
obeying him in all his commands and ordi- 
nances. Thus mindful of the future, while pro- 
viding for the present, during the six days you 
will be making the best preparation for keeping 
holy the Sabbath day, and attending, as you are 
bound to do, the Holy Communion, and other 
means of grace which that day offers to you. 

Once more, then, I ask, why you persist in 
neglecting this holy ordinance? Is it because 
the duty of attendance is not as expressly and 
positively enjoined in Scripture, as any other 
Christian duty, and therefore you think that, al- 



TO THE HOLY COMMUNION. 55 

though it may be well to be a Communicant, 
you are not guilty of disobedience to God in not 
being so ? What are our Saviour's words on 
this occasion? (for " the word that he has 
spoken," I pray you to remember, " the same 
shall judge us at the last day.") "Take, eat, 
this is my body : Drink ye all of this, for this 
is my blood of the New Testament. Do this in 
remembrance of me." Is this a mere permis- 
sion to attend ? are we left to be at liberty to 
choose whether we will communicate or not, 
and so be without offence in refusing to do so ? 
or is it not, in truth, a command, a command 
given by our Saviour in plain language, and, 
therefore, at our peril to be disobeyed? "Ho- 
nour thy father and thy mother, that thy days 
may be long in the land which the Lord thy 
God giveth thee." " This do in remembrance 
of me : for as often as ye eat this bread and 
drink this cup, ye do show the Lord's death till 
He come." The first is a command with a pro- 
mise annexed ; the second is no less a command 
with the blessing declared, which this Sacrament 
is intended to commemorate. Can either be dis- 
obeyed without incurring the anger of the divine 



56 AFFECTIONATE INVITATION 

Lawgiver ? The early Christians gave us no 
reason to suppose that they held the Sacrament 
of the Lord's Supper to be less binding on them 
than that of baptism : how necessary they held 
baptism you need no proof; and as to the com- 
munion, they are described by St. Luke as 
" continuing steadfastly in the Apostles' doctrine 
and fellowship, and in breaking of bread, and 
in prayers :" that is, in attending to the Apos- 
tles' preaching, in receiving the Lord's Supper, 
and in praying together : the duties were equally 
complied with, because equally required of them 
by their Lord and Saviour. They are expressly 
mentioned as " continuing daily with one accord 
in the temple, and breaking bread from house to 
house :" that is, after having preached publicly 
to the Jews in the temple, they retired to private 
houses to administer the Lord's Supper, where, 
alone, at that time, they could do it without in- 
terruption. And we are told in the Acts of the 
Apostles, chap, xx., that " on the first day of the 
week (answering to our Sunday,) when the dis- 
ciples came together to break bread, Paul 
preached unto them." Such was the practice of 
those who may be supposed best to have known 



TO THE HOLY COMMUNION. 57 

our Lord's mind : and if with them you think 
that baptism ought to be administered, you must 
think that the Lord's Supper likewise should: 
but how can the ministers of the Gospel admi- 
nister it, unless you, the people under their care, 
attend to receive it ? 

Say no more, then, that you are not as much 
bound to attend the Holy Communion, as to 
obey any other of your Saviour's commands ; 
for if He has been pleased to appoint a specific 
rite in which you are to remember gratefully his 
death and passion, what is it but perverseness 
of the worst kind to refuse to participate in that 
rite, and yet profess yourself his follower and 
disciple ? Is it, then, that, alarmed by that de- 
claration of St. Paul — " He that eateth and 
drinketh unworthily, eateth and drinketh damna- 
tion to himself," — you think it better not to par- 
take of the Lord's Supper, than incur the sin 
and punishment of partaking of it unworthily ? If 
you are really so fearful on this head, I pray you 
to attend to better words than mine, and be con- 
vinced that you are in no danger of receiving un- 
worthily in the Apostle's meaning. " For, the 
unworthy receiving which he so severely cen- 
5* 



58 AFFECTIONATE INVITATION 

sures in the Corinthians, was their approaching 
the Lord's Table with so improper a sense of 
the act they were performing, that they did not 
discern the Lord's body ; they made no distinc- 
tion between the bread of the Sacrament and 
common food. Such at that time was the con- 
dition of the Corinthians, that when they met to- 
gether to receive the Sacrament, which in those 
days was usually preceded by a common feast of 
rich and poor together, they used the church 
more as a place of riot and intemperance than 
as the house of God."* " When ye come to- 
gether in one place," saith the indignant Apos- 
tle, " this is not to eat the Lord's Supper. For, 
in eating, every one takes before other his own 
supper, and one is hungry and another is drunk- 
en. What ! ha\ 3 ye not houses to eat and drink 
in — or despise ye the Church of God? What 
shall I say to you ? Shall I praise you in this ? 
I praise you not." Such is the remonstrance 
of St. Paul ; and it is upon such unworthy, irre- 
verent, and profane partakers in the Lord's Sup- 
per as those whom he thus describes, that he 

* From Bishop Mant's Sermon on the Lord's Supper. 



TO THE HOLY COMMUNION. 59 

pronounces that formidable censure. But, surely, 
you, who are so fearful of coming to the Holy 
Communion, can be in no clanger of treating it 
with such profanation as this. 

But even on such unworthy partakers as were 
these Corinthians, the Apostle did not denounce 
eternal damnation, as you may perhaps suppose. 
For the word which he used was not intended 
by him to signify damnation, but judgment from 
God, some temporal punishment, as sickness or 
death : and that this is his meaning, and not the 
one which creates so much alarm, is evident 
from his saying directly afterwards, that when 
we are thus "judged," punished in this world, 
" we are chastened of the Lord, that v/e may 
not be condemned," not be sentenced to eternal 
misery in the next world. So you will observe, 
that you are in no danger, as the Communion is 
now administered, of committing the very sin so 
justly censured in the Corinthians : nor if you 
were, are the pains of hell threatened by the 
Apostle in this passage of Scripture for so doing. 
If you ask, who then is an unworthy partaker 
at this day ? I reply, shortly, that person who 
is so ignorant that he knows not for what pur- 



60 AFFECTIONATE INVITATION 

pose he approaches the Lord's Table, and who 
takes no pains to be instructed, as well as he 
who is a dissipated, careless liver, or an habitual 
hardened sinner, resolving not to leave off his 
sins : and such a person may be assured that 
neither is he fit to attend the Communion, nor to 
meet death : if he continues thus, and is not 
converted, his state is desperate indeed. 

In conversing with different members of my 
congregation respecting this solemn duty, I have 
sometimes heard it insinuated, rather than openly 
alleged as an excuse for their neglect, that many 
who do attend had better stay away, because 
they are so far from being better Christians after- 
wards, that they riot in their sins with as little 
compunction as before, and are not perhaps as 
religiously disposed and behaved as they who 
abstain from the Communion. I have heard 
this, I repeat, insinuated, rather than boldly 
avowed ; for at the very instant, it must have 
passed across the mind of the person, What 
have I to do with my neighbour's conduct? 
Shall I have to answer for him, or for myself? 
The truth is, this sitting in judgment on our 
neighbour's religious character is at all times a 



TO THE HOLY COMMUNION. 61 

very dangerous proceeding : but in the instance 
before us, the person may be asked this plain 
question, Whether he can for an instant believe 
that when at the last day he stands convicted be- 
fore his Judge, of neglecting the Communion, it 
will be sufficient for him to say, I stayed away 
from the Lord's Supper, because my neighbour 
did not appear to me to be better for attending : 
I have uniformly neglected Christ's last and po- 
sitive command, which I was continually warn- 
ed, and very well knew it was my duty to obey, 
because my neighbour profaned and abused it : 
in a word, I have made his unworthy perform- 
ance of a duty, a reason for my total neglect of 
it? That any one should dare to attend the 
Communion of Christ's Body and Blood with 
an unbelieving and impenitent heart, is without 
doubt an exceeding wickedness : but still one 
man's unworthily partaking will be no excuse 
for another's not partaking at all. The sin of 
others should rather act as a spur to our own 
piety. 

It has occasionally been said to me by those 
who appear to have turned their minds to the 
subject, and who acknowledge the seriousness of 



62 AFFECTIONATE INVITATION 

it, that they think it safest to stay away from the 
Lord's Supper, because if they commit sin after 
having communicated, their sin will on that ac- 
count be more sinful, and their salvation more in 
danger. Now there can be no doubt that the 
more and the stronger the resolutions we make 
against sin, and still relapse into it, the more 
have we reason to fear the fate of those who 
know the will of God, but do it not : because 
we are thus acting against that clear light, and 
that better knowledge of our duty, which we 
prove ourselves to have, by being communicants; 
but in this case, the Sacrament has no other 
effect, than any other strong resolution against 
sin would have : and, therefore, if this is a 
good reason for not communicating, we should 
never make any resolution against sin. Can 
we think that Christians may sin with greater 
freedom and safety by abstaining from the Com- 
munion ? Is sin of a less guilty nature, if the 
Communion be not received ? No one in his 
senses can suppose it. The Sacrament binds us 
only to what as Christians we were bound be- 
fore. And, therefore, they who do not come to 
the Lord's Table from the hope, that the punish- 



TO THE HOLY COMMUNION. 63 

ment of their sins will be slighter on that ac- 
count, are grievously deceiving themselves, and 
are actually trifling with their salvation. 

I have now examined those excuses for not 
attending the Communion which may probably 
have appeared to you to have some weight in 
justifying your neglect, and I have examined 
them very briefly, in the hope that you will find 
time on Sunday evenings to read what I have 
said ; which if you do attentively and impar- 
tially,! am persuaded you will see how groundless 
they are; that they proceed, in fact, almost alto- 
gether from the fatal carelessness about religious 
matters, too natural to mankind ; and, therefore, 
how utterly insufficient they must be for your 
security at the last day. But you will here 
perhaps say, Enough has been alleged to show 
that I am w 7 rong in not communicating : now let 
me be convinced of the positive necessity that 
exists for my being a communicant : — why am 
I so urgently called on to be so ? what are the 
benefits which I shall receive thereby ? — Now, 
respecting anything that is proposed to us for 
our compliance, the question that should natu- 
rally and properly arise is, Is it consistent with 



64 AFFECTIONATE INVITATION 

our duty and our interest? If it be the former, 
we shall, if rightly disposed, instantly conclude 
that it must be the latter, and shall hasten to 
show our belief that it is so, by a suitable prac- 
tice. Is it, then, your duty to be a communi- 
cant? If the express command of your Lord 
and Saviour, given, too, on the night before He 
suffered death for your sake, can make it a duty, 
you have already seen that it is ; and that no one 
injunction of the very many which He gave, and 
which are laid down in the Gospels and Epis- 
tles, is more positive, more binding on you, than 
this one of eating bread and drinking wine at his 
table in remembrance of Him. Is it your interest 
to be a communicant ? To this it would be suf- 
ficient to answer as above, that because it is 
your duty, it must be your interest ; inasmuch 
as Christ himself has said, " If a man love me, 
he will keep my words: and my Father will 
love him, and we will come unto him, and make 
our abode with him." The proof of our love of 
the Saviour is the keeping his commandments ; 
and the fruit of keeping his commandments is, 
that our heavenly Father will love us, and his 
divine light and grace will ever be present to 



TO THE HOLY COMMUNION. 65 

comfort, guide, and strengthen us. And if this 
is true of religious obedience in general, how 
pre-eminently is the gracious promise fulfilled to 
the devout attendant at the Lord's Table ! For 
if the argument which I have before used, be 
well grounded, that we are not expected to be 
perfect and strong-grown Christians before we 
partake of the Divine mysteries of the Commu- 
nion, but that it is enough that we earnestly 
desire and strenuously endeavour to be such, 
and so manifest our faith by repenting of and 
forsaking our sins: if this be so, as my study of 
God's words leads me to believe it is, we shall 
find the frequent use of the Holy Communion 
to be the most effectual means to that purpose. 

We are here in a vale of tears : where shall 
we seek for comfort, but from the source of all 
joy and satisfaction? We are surrounded with 
a multitude of temptations : where shall we find 
strength to resist them, but in this Divine ar- 
moury? We are loaded with many imperfec- 
tions,. and sometimes by negligence or surprise 
fall a prey to the tempter : what so proper to 
wash away our stain, (what else can do it?) as 
that precious, inestimable blood, which was shed 
6 



66 AFFECTIONATE INVITATION 

for that end and purpose? Our Saviour has told 
us, that "his flesh is meat indeed, and his blood 
is drink indeed;" that is, that his flesh and 
blood, " which are verily and indeed," in a 
spiritual manner, " taken and received by the 
faithful in the Lord's Supper," are for " the 
strengthening and refreshing of our souls, as our 
bodies are strengthened and refreshed by the 
bread and wine." When we are brought by 
the Divine mercy to a sense of our sins, and our 
souls are pierced with an unfeigned sorrow for 
having committed them ; what surer method 
have we of procuring our pardon from God, 
than by showing forth the Lord's death, by re- 
presenting his bitter passion to the Father, that 
so He would for his sake, according to the tenor 
of his covenant in Him, be favourable to us 
miserable sinners ? We all know, by fatal ex- 
perience, how unable we are of ourselves to do 
any thing that is good ; but this heavenly ban- 
quet is the food and nourishment of our souls ; 
it gives new life and vigour to our pious resolu- 
tions, and conveys power and strength to per- 
form our duty. There the penitent believer has 
the pardon of his past sins sealed, and fresh grace 



TO THE HOLY COMMUNION. 67 

bestowed to enable him to continue Christ's for 
ever, to increase more and more in holiness until 
he comes to God's everlasting kingdom : the 
work of mercy which was begun in Baptism, is 
in fact continued in the Lord's Supper, until it 
receives its full completion in the kingdom of 
Heaven. These, then, are the benefits of being 
a sincere communicant ; and great as they are, 
they are far greater in proportion to the fre- 
quency of your communion. The observation 
of nearly nineteen years, during which I have 
been called on as a parish priest to attend many 
hundreds of sick and dying persons, enables me 
to declare — and I entreat you not to disregard 
this fact — that a very great drawback from the 
spiritual comfort of the Communion, arising 
from doubt, fear, and remorse, has been felt and 
expressed by those who, having known their 
duty for many years, have yet become commu- 
nicants for the first time on their death beds ; 
the sting of conscience for a long-continued dis- 
obedience in so important a part of a Christian's 
duty cannot at once be got rid of. Whereas, 
blessed, oh ! inexpressibly blessed are they, who, 
having habitually in the days of health, conscien- 



68 AFFECTIONATE INVITATION 

tiously and sincerely, however imperfectly, 
obeyed their Saviour's command, can at the hour 
of death have recourse to it for the last time 
with increased confidence, and say, " Lord, now 
lettest thou thy servant depart in peace ; for 
mine eyes have seen thy salvation." 

And now, my friend, on the supposition that 
you have read thus far, and have set your heart 
to a serious consideration of this sacred ordi- 
nance, if through the Divine blessing you should 
be led to acknowledge the benefits of attending, 
the danger of neglecting it, and therefore to form 
the resolution of doing your duty as a Christian 
should ; do not suffer yourself, I conjure you, 
to be led away by a too common infirmity of 
human nature, and put ofT the performance of 
this godly resolution ; do not imitate the self- 
convicted judge — "Go thy way for this time: 
when I have a convenient season, I will call for 
thee." It is by yielding to this delusion of the 
great enemy of mankind, the trusting to a future 
time to do that for which no time is so proper as 
the present, that so many poor souls make ship- 
wreck of their salvation. Although past the 
spring-time of life, you - are yet, perhaps, in 



TO THE HOLY COMMUNION, 69 

sound health, and looking forward to the enjoy- 
ment of many years : or if not altogether free 
from bodily ailing, your complaints are not at 
present dangerous, and are of such a nature as 
promise to give you a sufficient warning ere 
they become so : and is it thus, let me first ask 
you, that you show your gratitude to God for 
giving you health, by refusing to obey the last 
command of his only-begotten Son? or can it 
be right, think you, so to turn a deaf ear to the 
admonition, which along continuance of bodily 
disorder and weakness is calculated to afford, as 
not to commemorate the offering up of that body 
and blood, of which, if we spiritually partake 
not, we have no life in us.* If you are in 
health, devote the first fruits of your strength to 
the Divine Giver thereof, and let not the hour of 
sickness be the first time of your obeying the 
last command of your God and Saviour; and 
if you are reminded, by some long-continuing 
weakness, of the perishable nature of your body, 
be thereby reminded at the same time, that this 
malady is sent you by God as a medicine to 

* John vi. 53. 
6* 



70 AFFECTIONATE INVITATION 

cure the far greater malady of your soul ; and if 
you are not thus brought to walk in all the ordi- 
nances of the Lord blameless, you have all the 
bitterness of the draught, without any of its 
healing properties. But, strong and vigorous 
as you now are, have you any assurance of your 
continuing so ? or have you been promised such 
a notice of an approaching change as will give 
you time to buy oil for your lamp, and to pre- 
pare to meet your Lord ? Full well you know 
that you must answer "nay," to both these 
questions ; and, if so, what a fearful risk you 
run ! In what peril do you leave your soul ! 
You are content to leave to a most uncertain 
chance your ability of complying with that 
which is rightly called, " generally necessary 
to your salvation," that is, to the salvation of all 
Christians who have the means of knowing and 
performing their duty in this respect. If, when 
afflicted with some dangerous bodily disease, a 
physician should visit you, and after inquiring 
into and ascertaining the causes and nature of 
your illness, should prescribe such and such a 
plan to be pursued, and such remedies to be 
taken for restoring you to health, would you 



TO THE HOLY COMMUNION. 71 

not, if you had faith in his skill, follow his ad- 
vice, and take his medicines, and acknowledge, 
moreover, that you would have no right to look 
for a cure if you did not? Now Jesus Christ is 
the physician of your soul. He came into the 
world to cure its diseases. And besides the pre- 
cepts and doctrines laid down in his Gospel for 
your practice and belief, which may be called 
his regimen, He has ordered bread and wine in 
the Communion, to be frequently administered 
as a sovereign medicine, if properly taken, for 
the recovery of us his diseased patients. But 
you will go on months and years, delaying to 
comply with his directions, and trusting to some 
future opportunity, which you have no assurance 
of ever having; and thus, perhaps, die, without 
ever, in spite of repeated exhortations and in- 
vitations, having fulfilled this great and solemn 
duty. 

I will suppose, however, what you may deem 
a more favourable case, that, after a long conti- 
nuance of health, you should be visited with an 
illness which, though likely to lead to a fatal 
termination, is unattended with any violent pain 
of body, or loss of senses ; and which, therefore, 



72 AFFECTIONATE INVITATION 

leaves you the power of listening to your minis- 
ter's instruction, and of receiving, after all, the 
blessed Sacrament at his hands. And as there 
is a chance of this (in your opinion) satisfactory 
settlement of your spiritual concerns, a chance 
which you think yourself justified in expecting 
by seeing some of your neighbours so fortunate, 
you are content to take it, and, meanwhile, turn 
a deaf ear to all exhortation to the contrary. 
And this you do because you think the call of 
duty will be thus satisfied, a whole life of diso- 
bedience thus compounded for; the Communion 
once received will be available to your salvation 
although received at the eleventh hour, and the 
service offered be as acceptable to God as if you 
had regularly paid it in the days of health. But 
this you may be assured is an error, and a very 
fearful one. God's word forbids that they who 
for many years have known their duty in this 
respect, and done it not, who, ready to fall into 
the grave, and only because they are ready to 
fall into the grave, for the first time partake in 
the Sacrament, should have any right to expect 
that spiritual comfort in the ordinance, which 
will surely be theirs who, for the last time, at 



TO THE HOLY COMMUNION. 73 

the hour of death, have recourse to that which 
has been their constant support through life. To 
such it will bring pardon and peace ; but for the 
others, God's ministers can only hope and pray 
that it may not be too late, that the mercy so 
often and for so many years despised, may yet 
be obtained, and that the Lord's death, which 
they have never before shown forth, may yet 
avail to the pardon of this among their other 
sins. This, however, is a far, very far different 
state from that in which you, my friend, would 
wish to be when you come to die ; for thus to 
offer up that which costs you nothing, thus to 
serve the Lord when you can do nothing else, 
thus to dedicate to Him the poor remains of that 
strength of which the first fruits should have 
been His : what is it but seeking the kingdom 
of God and His righteousness, not as your first, 
not even as your second consideration, but as the 
very last ? And can you think yourself safe, in 
spite of repeated warnings, and in spite of know- 
ing your duty in this respect, as you must do, so 
to hazard your soul ? The Sacrament of Bap- 
tism, being the Sacrament of introduction into 
the Gospel covenant, is of course not to be re- 



74 AFFECTIONATE INVITATION 

peated: the Sacrament of the Lord's Supper 
being the standing memorial of that sacrifice 
which is the seal of the covenant, is to be re- 
peated, is to be partaken of by us until the Lord 
come again to judgment : but how little anxious 
to remember to commemorate that sacrifice by 
which alone we live, do they show themselves 
who do not, until their eyes are almost closing 
on this world, have recourse to that rite which 
Christ himself appointed as commemorative of 
it ! and how can they expect to benefit by the 
sacrifice itself, who, in so important a point, 
persist in disobeying Him, who was himself at 
once the great High-Priest, the Offerer, and the 
Lamb, without blemish and without spot, that 
was offered? 

Consider, then, I entreat you, my friend, all 
these things with the seriousness they merit; 
k< set your heart unto all the words which I tes- 
tify among you this day, which ye shall com- 
mand your children to observe, to do all the 
words of this law. For it is not a vain thing for 
you ; because it is your life."* And remember, 

• Deut. xxxii. 46, 47. 



TO THE HOLY COMMUNION. 75 

you are not among those who can truly plead 
ignorance of their duty in this respect, or who 
never have been warned or admonished about it. 
Read, then, attentively the twenty-sixth chapter 
of St. Matthew, the twenty-second chapter of 
St. Luke, the sixth chapter of St. John, the 
eleventh chapter of the first epistle to the Corin- 
thians, and finally, as a most valuable and scrip- 
tural commentary on them all, the Communion 
Service of our Church. Pray, fervently pray, 
for God's enlightening grace, that you may see 
the things that belong to your peace ; and for 
His assisting and strengthening grace, that you 
may be disposed and enabled to do them before 
they are hidden from your eyes. And while as 
your minister I cease not, night and morning, to 
pray for the Divine blessing on this and every 
other endeavour to teach and lead you into the 
good and the right way, I at the same time most 
earnestly request you, if what I have said is not 
sufficiently plain, or if any scruples yet remain 
which I have not alluded to, or succeeded in re- 
moving, to come to me at any hour most conve- 
venient to yourself, and candidly state them in 
private. 



76 AFFECTIONATE INVITATION 

As a conclusion to the whole, weigh well this 
very simple, very short statement of the case : 
Christ has died to save me ; but as one condition 
of my receiving that salvation, He has enjoined 
on me a positive, easy, and beneficial duty ; I 
have been told of this, repeatedly exhorted, ear- 
nestly entreated to fulfil it: but I have uniformly 
and through my whole life neglected it; what 
then must be my hopes from a Judge supremely 
just, who has declared, "If ye love me, keep 
my commandments ?" Thus will the case stand 
with you at the hour of death, if you persist in 
refusing to receive the Lord's Supper. But how 
ought it to stand? Christ, the King of Glory, 
did humble himself even to the death upon the 
cross, for me a miserable sinner, who lay in 
darkness and the shadow of death, that He 
might make me a child of God, and exalt me to 
everlasting life : He has instituted and ordained 
holy mysteries as pledges of his love, and for a 
continual remembrance of his death, to my great 
and endless comfort ; I will therefore be neither 
monstrously ungrateful to Him, nor wanting to 
my own interest, but will hasten to lay hold of 
these blessed pledges, and will do as He has 



TO THE HOLY COMMUNION. 77 

commanded me. " What reward shall I give 
unto the Lord for all the benefits that he hath 
done unto me ? I will receive the cup of salva- 
tion, and call upon the name of the Lord." 



HOLY COMMUNION. 

And are we now brought near to God, 

Who once at distance stood? 
And, to effect this glorious change, 

Did Jesus shed His blood 1 

Oh for a song of ardent praise, 

To bear our souls above ! 
What should allay our lively hope, 

Or damp our flaming love 1 

Then let us join the heavenly choirs, 
To praise our heavenly King ! 

Oh may that love which spread this board, 
Inspire us while we sing — 

" Glory to God in highest strains, 
And to the earth be peace; 
Good will from Heaven to men is come, 
And let it never cease," 



AN 



INTRODUCTION 



TO THE 



HOLY COMMUNION 



REV. SAMUEL WILBERFORCE, M. A. 



ARCHDEACON OF SURREY. 



AS OFTEN AS YE EAT THIS 
BREAD, AND DRINK THIS 
CUP, YE DO SHOW THE 
LORD'S DEATH TILL HE 
COME. — 1 COR. XI 26, 



INTRODUCTION 



TO THE 



HOLY COMMUNION. 



As a matter of mere abstract reasoning, there 
can be little difference amongst members of the 
Church as to the importance of a regular attend- 
ance at the table of the Lord ; or little doubt, that 
they who habitually, and of settled purpose, ne- 
glect that holy rite, must be set down with those 
who live in any other wilful sin, whether of 
omission or commission. The unhappy logic 
which can relax the obligation of that plain and 
affectionate command, " Do this in remembrance 
of me," can as easily explain away any other of 
the laws of God. Yet this is only one amongst 
many instances which show the little worth of 
7* 



82 AFFECTIONATE INVITATION 

abstract acknowledgments of duty. Men live 
by a different rule — by the law of their own 
habits, and of the tone of life around them ; and 
that this is in direct opposition to the theoretical 
admission of the universal duty of communicat- 
ing, is but too clear on all sides. How many 
may be found in every church, who rise with 
utter unconcern to quit the half-concluded ser- 
vice, when they know that they shall soon be 
bidden to " draw near with faith, and take that 
holy sacrament to their comfort !" It seems 
never to cost them a thought — it is a settled 
principle, on which they may act without the 
trouble of a separate process of deliberation. 
The feast is not for them. Yet how would this 
decent multitude endure the address which in 
the old times of the Church they could not have 
escaped? — " Ye that cannot communicate, walk 
off and begone. Let no . . . infidel be present ; 
no heterodox person ; no heretic."* 

On this temper of the times no thoughtful 
Christian can look without pain ; for though 

* Apostol. Constitut. lib. viii. cap. 12; quoted by Bing- 
ham, Antiq. b. xiii. cap. 1. 



TO THE HOLY COMMUNION. 83 

there may have been some increase in the num- 
ber of communicants, it has undoubtedly kept 
no due relation to the increase of apparent piety 
amongst us. The complaint may still be made, 
"How insignificant is the proportion of that 
little company, which, when the bulk of the con- 
gregation has retired, and the doors are closed, 
thankfully gather round the table of the Lord, to 
commemorate the Saviour's meritorious cross 
and passion ; and in this little company, how 
small is the number of the young! — where are 
the lambs of the fold ?"* 

If, then, the evil be admitted, it is of no little 
moment to inquire into the causes which have 
helped it forward. Now, amongst the foremost 
of these appear to be two widely spread miscon- 
ceptions, which, seeming at first sight destruc- 
tive of each other, do in fact combine to bring 
about the same result. One of these, beginning 
with paying a seeming reverence to the holy 
rite, would represent it as too great and holy to 
be approached by ordinary Christians. Those 

* Charge of the Lord Bishop of Winchester for 1837, 
p. 23. 



84 AFFECTIONATE INVITATION 

whom matured age, and long-established habits, 
or greater spirituality of mind, seem to mark as 
belonging to the higher classes in the Christian 
school, may safely draw near and rejoice in their 
privilege ; but for those who are still compassed 
about with temptation, still weak in faith, and 
not sure of themselves, they had better wait, 
lest, by a premature reception of the holy sacra- 
ment, they do but increase the guilt of their 
after-offences, if not " eat and drink their own 
damnation." This is one of the most common 
grounds for living in the absolute neglect of the 
holy office. The young think themselves too 
giddy, the middle-aged too full of occupation, the 
poor too full of cares, the rich too full of busi- 
ness ; professional employments keep the men, 
the trials of a family the women ; and so, by 
common consent, they stay away from commu- 
nion, thinking that they are but treating with due 
reverence so great a mystery. It is much to be 
feared that, in many cases, the tone of our min- 
istry has rather tended to help on than check 
this error. We have grown to connive at such 
excuses, in our desire to keep the table of the 
Lord free from unfaithful worshippers. We 



TO THE HOLY COMMUNION. 85 

hear, in common language, the number of " the 
congregation," not of the communicants, at any 
church. The man who does communicate is 
marked as doing something more than others, 
rather than the non-communicant as doing less. 
We suffer ordinary Christians to attend week 
by week, and even year by year, upon our min- 
istry, and never come to the communion ; instead 
of feeling it a monstrous thing, and plainly show- 
ing that we feel it such. 

Yet, what can be more injurious to a minis- 
try ? for it is, in fact, yielding to that universal 
temptation of putting off all serious care about 
religion to a "more convenient season." It is 
allowing that men may be Christians, and may 
profit by the hearing of God's word, though they 
cannot bring themselves to that true devotedness 
of heart and life which would warrant their ha- 
bitual presence at the holy table. 

The first working of this error may be often 
traced to the time of confirmation. That holy 
rite is intended by the Church to admit the 
catechumen to the class of full-grown Chris- 
tians, and to all the privileges of believers. Of 
these the chiefest and most evident is a partak- 



bb AFFECTIONATE INVITATION 

ing of this holy feast. But from this the young 
are apt to shrink. Confirmation has been a step, 
and for the present they are contented with it ; 
after a while, they look forward to communi- 
cating as another. " Let us," is their language, 
"have time to try our sincerity, to see whether 
we act up to our vows ; and then hereafter we 
may take our places at the holy table." How 
thin a veil is this to cover self-dependanee, and 
an unfaithful estimation of the eucharist as the 
distinction of a class rather than a means of 
grace ! Now this is the natural temptation of 
the young ; but then, alas, how often is it aided, 
and not checked, by parents and sponsors ! How 
often do they, longing earnestly to see more evi- 
dent marks of the working of God's blessed 
Spirit on the hearts of those committed to them, 
encourage them in putting off communion until 
they are better fitted for it ! And so this precious 
opportunity is lost. For in many cases this is 
the turning point. If the confirmed catechumen 
seals his vows at the holy table, and seeks for a 
living might in communion with his Lord, he 
" goes on thence from strength to strength, until 
he appears before his God in Zion." But if he 



TO THE HOLY GOMMUNION. 87 

postpones communicating, and waits to become 
litter, the Spirit of the Lord ceases to strive with 
him, his better feelings die away, he falls under 
the power of some temptation, and perhaps never 
more regains that state of promise which he had 
reached at confirmation. 

The other error which, from a very different 
quarter, helps on this evil, is of a subtler form. 
Here the duty of communicating is really allow- 
ed ; but fears are expressed lest by strongly press- 
ing it on men, you should engender something of 
formality, if not fall at last amongst the snares 
of Romanist delusions. " Certainly it is a duty ; 
but why put it so prominently forward ? you will 
make men think that all religion consists in at- 
tending the sacrament." Such is no unfrequent 
language ; yet what is this but the deadly error 
of attacking formalism by removing forms instead 
of infusing spirit? It is pulling down the scaf- 
folding because its work is not accomplished ; it 
is cutting off the limbs lest men should confound 
them with the inner principle of life ; it is to 
encourage men in staying away from commu- 
nion altogether, instead of striving to bring them 
to it in a more faithful and earnest spirit. This 



88 AFFECTIONATE INVITATION 

is a fruit of the low and degenerate mysticism 
which is every where abroad ; which, setting 
out by seeking to promote the essence and inner 
life of piety, ends by destroying its very exist- 
ence; which tears down, in its misguided zeal, 
those necessary stays on which the tender shoots 
of holy affections must be long trained and helped 
to mount to heaven. 

It is, in fact, the error of the earlier mystic, 
without his redeeming features of abstraction 
from the world, and intense devotion. How 
much healthier is the tone of that true-hearted 
man, who from his cell in Saxony raised his 
voice indeed against the errors of the Popish 
system, but who could not bear the jargon which 
teaches us to attain high ends by throwing off 
the only means of reaching them ! With homely 
earnestness he charges on the devil the delusion, 
which, continually crying, " Spirit ! spirit ! spirit ! 
destroys the while all roads, bridges, scaling-lad- 
ders, and paths, by which the Spirit can enter; 
namely, the visible order established by God in 
holy baptism, in outward forms, and in his own 
word." 

And here is the secret link between these 



TO THE HOLY COMMUNION. 89 

seemingly discordant errors. Each of them ob- 
scures that great characteristic of the rite, that 
it is an especial means of grace. This leads 
those who fall into the first, to look at it mainly 
as a badge, or a profession, and so to " fence the 
table" against the weak and trembling, and make 
attendance at it the privilege of a peculiar class. 
This leads the others to speak little of it ; to deem 
it rather a comfort and privilege attendant on the 
spiritual life, than a chief means of its support; 
and so to press rather the direct attainment of 
that inner frame of feelings, which they deem 
solely important, forgetting that this is to be ac- 
quired through the use of outward means. 

If, then, we would promote a due attendance 
at the Holy Supper, we must set ourselves firmly 
against both these delusions ; we must, on all 
occasions, press home the truth, that to commu- 
nicate is the privilege and the duty of every 
Christian ; that it is meant not for one class, but 
for all. Having first removed the mistaken fears 
with which the change of language has invested 
the term "damnation," we must go on to press 
on men that none " can eat and drink their own 
judgment " except the wantonly careless, or the 
8 



90 AFFECTIONATE INVITATION 

wilfully profane ; whilst all who stay away com- 
mit each separate time a separate sin ; that the 
mournful probability of our falling into after-sins 
of infirmity, is no reason why we should absent 
ourselves, and so increase the danger and dimin- 
ish the power of resistance ; that Christ our 
Lord hath bidden all attend — the weak, the 
trembling, the faint-hearted; and that He cer- 
tainly, who so loved men as to shed his precious 
blood for them, could intend, in this invitation, 
no trap for weak believers, no snare for tender 
consciences ; that nothing but the wilful practice 
of known and habitual sin can turn that holy 
food into poison, and so be a sufficient reason 
for abstaining from it. To this, too, must be 
added a clear picture of the loss which men incur 
by thus passing on themselves a needless sen- 
tence of voluntary excommunication. As in the 
holy eucharist, more than in any other way, is 
the death of our Master showed forth " until He 
come;" so certainly in it, more than by any 
other means, is communion with our only Saviour 
to be gained, and those gifts of grace secured, 
whereby alone we can forsake sin, or grow in 
holiness of life. Let every doubtful soul weigh 



TO THE HOLY COMMUNION. 91 

well this thought : Whither would it go for par- 
don for the past, for grace for the future, save 
unto the Lord Jesus? and where shall it go by 
a straighter or a surer road than by that which 
He hath here provided ? In every such case, no 
doubt, there must be a struggle : the sense of 
guilt would always drive us from our Lord ; but 
is not this to be driven to perdition ? And is 
there not here His gracious voice bidding us to 
come? "Were it not so," says St. Bernard, 
"what should I do when I heard the Lord's 
approach — should I not fly as Adam did, who 
fled from His face, and yet escaped not ? Should 
not I despair when I heard that He was coming, 
whose law I have so broken, whose patience I 
have so abused, to whose kindness I have proved 
so oft ungrateful ? But what stay could be greater 
than that of His own word of consolation ? 
Wherefore, He says himself that ' The Son 
came not to condemn the world, but that the 
world through Him might be saved.' Now, 
then, I draw near with confidence, I pray with 
filial trust; for why should I fear, when the 
Saviour hath come into my house ? against Him 
only have I sinned; what He hath pardoned 



92 AFFECTIONATE INVITATION 

needs must be forgiven. ' Who shall lay any 
thing to the charge of God's elect?' " * 

Nor need the harassing remains of sin, so that 
we truly strive against them, keep us from our 
remedy. Here it is that we are in a special 
manner, and after a heavenly sort, to be made 
one with Christ our Lord, and to receive there- 
fore of His strength. The very provision of so 
great a medicine may assure us of our cure ; for 
"no wise physician would consume his costliest 
drugs upon a hopeless case."t And if we refuse 
the remedy, how can we escape the sentence of 
the slothful servant ? Surely the Christian man, 
who lets his fear of offending keep him from the 
holy table, fills up, more than any one beside, 
that fearful character. Surely, above all men, 
he declares that he " knew his Lord to be a 
hard man, reaping where he had not sowed;" 
and that therefore "he was afraid, and went and 
digged in the earth," to hide the talent where- 
with he had been entrusted. 

And if vain fears may not keep us from the 

* S. Bernard. Serm. in Epiph. Dom. i. § 3. 
■f- S. Bernard. Serm. in Nativ. iii. § 5. 



TO THE HOLY COMMUNION. 93 

holy eucharist, surely still less may an empty 
apprehension of formality teach us to think 
lightly of it. Means indeed are nothing in them- 
selves, but they are the way to God; and as we 
have no right to choose some and neglect others 
— to hope, for instance, that prayer or medita- 
tion, or God's word, can be blessed to him who 
refuses communion, — so, if we did choose, what 
could we choose before this holy feast? Surely 
it and Christian baptism bear a peculiar charac- 
ter amongst the other means of grace. Is it not, 
in an especial sense, the Christian's privilege ? 
is it not the aptest showing forth of the Lord's 
death — the meetest instrument for our commu- 
nion with Him ? It were no true sacrament, if 
there were not in it greater blessings than in any 
of the ordinary means and opportunities of grace 
which men may at their will appoint, or at their 
discretion intermit. How, otherwise, would it 
differ from times of especial devotion, from sea- 
sons of especial prayer? and if it differs not, 
what is its essence as a sacrament? Because, 
then, its very nature has been overthrown in the 
idolatrous abuse to which the Romanists pervert 
it, let not Christian men fall into another error, 
8* 



94 AFFECTIONATE INVITATION 

and lower down into a mere commemorative rite 
that which Christ hath given them for a higher 
purpose. " For we take not baptism nor the 
eucharist for bare resemblances or memorials of 
things absent, neither for naked signs and testi- 
monies, assuring us of grace received before, 
but (as they are indeed and in verity) for means 
effectual, whereby God, when we take the sacra- 
ment, delivereth into our hands that grace avail- 
able unto eternal life, which grace the sacraments 

represent or signify We receive Christ 

Jesus in the eucharist often, as being, by con- 
tinued degrees, the finisher of our life ... we 
receive Him, imparting therein himself."* 

Let no man, therefore, hope to maintain with- 
in himself the inner life of piety, whilst he ne- 
glects these evident means of sustaining it; for 
" it is not ordinarily Cod's will to bestow the 
grace of sacraments on any but by the sacra- 
ments."! It is by them that Christ "deriveth 
unto every several member of His church that 
saving grace which He originally is." The true 
guard against formality is no undervaluing of 
sacraments ; it is the continual remembrance 

* Hooker, Eccles. Pol. b. v. § 57. § Id., ib. 



TO THE HOLY COMMUNION. 95 

that the " grace which men receive by them, 
they receive it from God, and not from them. 
For that of sacraments, the very same is true 
which Solomon's wisdom observeth in the bra- 
zen serpent: 'he that turned towards it was 
not healed by the thing he saw, but by Thee, O 
Saviour of all.' " * And to those who desire to 
approach the eucharist with such a diligent and 
earnest faith, this little volumet may (with God's 
blessing) render some assistance. It diners from 
most works of the kind, in being wholly gathered 
from the writings of old divines of the English 
Church ; and thus secures the presence of that 
raciness and strength which are so rare in mo- 
dern books of devotion. Who has not felt this 
difference ? Who can turn from the writings of 
St. Augustin, St. Bernard, or of Hooker and 
Leigh ton, to most of this day, without remem- 
bering the sacred words, " No man having drunk 
old wine straightway desireth new : for he saith, 
The old is better ?" 

But this is not all : we must live with those 

* Hooker, Eccles. Pol., b. v. § 57. 
j- Wilberforce's Eucharistica is here referred to ; an ad- 
mirable manual for communicants. — Editor. 



96 AFFECTIONATE INVITATION 

around us ; to the contagion of their errors we 
are always exposed. These we must meet with 
in some measure, even in our teachers ; for their 
minds will, more or less, be tinged with the pre- 
valent opinions of the day. They, therefore, 
who would be in any measure free from this evil, 
must often retire from their immediate equals, to 
converse with men of other times. We must 
think their thoughts ; we must look at truth with 
them, and see it in other lights and colours than 
those which have rested always on our own 
path: and this applies, with especial force at 
this time, to the subject of the eucharist. Dis- 
cussion and division have been rife amongst us, 
and they have done their common work of evil ; 
for as men contend, they strengthen their own 
views, and grow to look on others with a readier 
and more morbid exclusiveness. Each party 
sees strongly some portion of the truth; and, 
in their zeal for it, too commonly forget that 
partial truth is amongst the most pernicious 
forms of error. At such a time, the voice of the 
great and holy dead is of peculiar value. They 
are free from our contentions ; and the harmony 
and grandeur which dwell on their passionless 



TO THE HOLY COMMUNION. 97 

and even judgments remind us of the peacefulness 
with which their spirits now embrace truth and 
one another in Paradise ; and their voice will be 
heard, as from the depth of an oracle, above the 
strife and din of our jarring tumults. 

To converse, then, in these pages for a while 
with such, the reader is invited : not that it is 
always needful to go through a long course of 
preparation before partaking of the eucharist; 
on the contrary, the Christian man should al- 
ways be ready to approach it, nor ever turn 
away merely because he has no such peculiar 
opportunity of leisure ; but that when he has 
opportunity and leisure, he may be aided in 
turning them to good account. And for those 
that can command it, what time can be laid out 
to better purpose, or gather in a richer harvest? 
The gifts of God, indeed, are poured upon us 
freely ; but, as His ordinary rule, it is those who 
seek that find. He that has truly watched and 
prayed, that has cleansed his soul with an un- 
feigned humiliation, and trimmed the fires of 
love, and zeal, and devotion, before he drew near 
to the holy table, may expect, of God's mercy, 
to find the greatest refreshment there, to enjoy 



98 AFFECTIONATE INVITATION, ETC. 

the nearest communion with his Lord and Saviour, 
and to go away the most enriched with grace. For 
" to him that hath shall be given :" and though we 
can by prayer and labour earn nothing for our- 
selves, we must pray and labour, if we would 
receive any thing from Him. And those who do 
thus labour shall receive. They may not, indeed, 
at the time perceive their own inward profiting. 
It may be that God may try their faith, by suffer- 
ing them for a while to lack the present refresh- 
ment of sensible joy ; but not a whit the less cer- 
tain is their gain. We must not judge of the 
presence or the absence of God's most Holy 
Spirit by the ebb or flowing of our own ever- 
shifting tide of feeling. We must not strive to 
work up ourselves to that joy which we desire. 
This were indeed to " walk by sight;" and our 
new life is " to be hid with Christ in God." We 
have the sure words of Christ : let them sink into 
our hearts ; let us believe, not wrangle about 
them : " Whoso eateth my flesh, and drinketh 
my blood, hath eternal life ; and I will raise him 
up at the last day. For my flesh is meat indeed, 
and my blood is drink indeed." 



YOUNG PERSONS INVITED 



TO THE 



L ORD'S TABLE 



BY THE 

REV. EDWARD BERENS, M, A. 

ARCHDEACON OF BERKS, 



This do in remembrance of me. 

St. Luke, xxii. 19. 

If ye love me, keep my Commandments, 

St. John, xiv. 15. 

I love them that love me, and those that seek me 

EARLY SHALL FIND ME. 

Prov. viii. 17. 



YOUNG PERSONS INVITED 



TO THE 



LORD'S TABLE. 



Among the many and various pleas which 
are advanced, in vindication of neglect of the 
Lord's Supper, one of the most prevalent is the 
plea of youth. Very many young persons, 
who in other respects are religiously disposed, 
absent themselves from the Lord's Table almost 
as a matter of course. They thus acquire a 
habit of neglecting, without compunction, their 
Redeemer's dying command: the habit gains 
strength as they advance in years ; and perhaps 
they never receive this Holy Sacrament, or re- 
9 



102 AFFECTIONATE INVITATION 

ceive it only on their death-bed. — It is very de- 
sirable to do away so dangerous a delusion. 

It is the judgment of our Church, that all per- 
sons who are old enough to be confirmed, — all 
persons who have come to years of discretion, — 
are old enough to receive the Lord's Supper ; 
and that, consequently, they cannot neglect it 
without being guilty of sin, — the sin of omitting 
a known duty. In most foreign countries, which 
profess the Christian religion, young persons are 
in the habit of communicating from an early age. 
In this country, however, a mistaken notion too 
generally prevails, that this Sacrament is intend- 
ed only for the more advanced in years, and that 
for a young person to partake of it is a danger- 
ous presumption. Not satisfied with abstaining 
from it themselves, some people endeavour to 
dissuade others ; and perhaps blame and judge 
those who comply with the Lord's dying injunc- 
tion. The whole of this conduct is founded in 
mistake, and proceeds from not properly consi- 
dering and understanding either the nature of the 
Christian Religion in general, or that of this Sa- 
crament in particular. 

It appears to be the design and the spirit of 



TO THE HOLY COMMUNION. 103 

religion, that we should be dedicated to God — 
should belong to God — before the world or the 
devil have taken possession of us. As God di- 
rected the children of his chosen people to be 
entered into covenant with him at eight days 
old, so, from the earliest time, it has been the 
practice of the Church of Christ to baptize the 
children of Christian parents in infancy, and 
thus to make them subjects of God's spiritual 
kingdom. Under the Old Dispensation it was 
said, that out of the mouths of babes and suck- 
lings God hath ordained strength, or perfected 
praise ; and under the New we are told, that our 
Lord said, Suffer little children to come unto 
me, and forbid them not. 

As children have been dedicated to Christ in 
baptism, so, as their minds and understandings 
begin to open, they are to be imbued with such 
religious truths as are most easy of comprehen- 
sion, and carefully taught which be the first 
principles of the oracles of God. As the mind 
advances, they should advance in knowledge ; 
and at the age of fifteen or sixteen years, they 
may fairly be supposed to be sufficiently in- 
structed in all things that a Christian ought to 



104 AFFECTIONATE INVITATION 

know and believe for his soul's health. They 
are then quite old enough to understand the ac- 
count given of the Lord's Supper in the Cate- 
chism and in the Communion Service ; they are 
then quite old enough to perceive, that there is 
the same reason for their communicating now, 
that there was for their being baptized when 
children : and that they cannot neglect to com- 
municate, without disobedience to the authority 
of Jesus Christ. They are old enough to under- 
stand the chief truths of the Christian religion, 
which are summed up and represented in the 
Sacrament of the Lord's Supper. The death of 
Christ for our sins is particularly shown forth 
and represented in the Lord's Supper ; of which 
all are old enough to partake, who are old enough 
to understand the danger and the punishment of 
sin, and the greatness of the redemption effected 
for us by the death of the Son of God. 

I am confident that there is no one who does 
not acknowledge the justice and the propriety of 
complying with the advice of Solomon, to re- 
member our Creator in the days of our youth. 
And shall not those who are in the days of their 
youth remember their Redeemer also ? And if 



TO THE HOLY COMMUNION. 105 

they remember him at all, shall they refuse to 
remember him in the way which he himself ap- 
pointed, when he gave the bread and the wine, 
and said expressly, This do in remembrance of 
me! Can the young hope to be saved in any 
other way than by the death of Christ? And 
can they hope to be saved by that death, if they 
refuse to commemorate it, — to show it forth, — 
in the way which the Lord hath commanded : 
which they themselves know, and acknowledge, 
that He hath commanded ! 

And what reason can they pretend for refusing 
to communicate ? Surely, not that young peo- 
ple do well, while they continue young, to fol- 
low the bent of their own will, and to enjoy 
themselves as they can, without troubling them- 
selves with thinking of religion. None of you, 
I am persuaded, can think this. God hath given 
no one, — no one whatever, whether young, or 
old, a licence to sin. If a young man, in the 
high spirits and confident presumption of youth, 
chooses to walk after the ways of his own heart, 
in whatever sin his wayward will may choose, 
he is solemnly warned, that for all these things 
God will bring him into judgment. We have 
9* 



106 AFFECTIONATE INVITATION 

been enlisted as the soldiers of Jesus Christ, 
and all, whether old or young, must " fight man- 
fully under his banner, against sin, the world, 
and the devil." If we hope to succeed, we must 
humbly seek for fresh supplies of strength and 
vigour in that ordinance which was appointed 
on purpose for the strengthening and refreshing 
of our souls. 

Neither can any of yon be so unwise as to 
say, " we will enjoy ourselves now, and it will 
be time enough to think of religion, and of the 
Sacrament, when we begin to grow old." You 
know well that you may not live to grow old : 
for what is your life ? it is even a vapour tvhich 
appearethfor a little while, and then vanisheth 
away ! We none of us know what shall be on 
the morrow ; and if we venture to put off the 
time for thinking seriously of religion, the delay 
may be the ruin of our souls for ever. 

But, perhaps, some may be disposed to think, 
that receiving the Lord's Supper is so solemn and 
serious a thing, as to be inconsistent with the 
cheerfulness and joyous spirits of youth. Reli- 
gion, certainly, is no enemy to a well-regulated 
cheerfulness, and is far from recommending or 



TO THE HOLY COMMUNION. 107 

encouraging a gloomy and melancholy deport- 
ment. And as in religion in general, so in the 
Lord's Supper, which is the highest office of 
religion, there is nothing inconsistent with a 
proper cheerfulness. It is true, that religion 
allows nobody, whether young or old, to be 
thoughtless and inconsiderate ; and young peo- 
ple, long before they attain the age which I have 
mentioned, ought to be in the habit of consider- 
ing their ways ; of considering themselves as 
in the constant presence of God ; of wisely con- 
sidering their latter end ; of considering what is 
likely to be their situation in the world to come. 
But such consideration is compatible with a well- 
regulated cheerfulness, and is also a main part of 
the proper preparation for the Lord's Supper. 

Or do any think that young people should not 
come to the Lord's Supper, on account of the 
peculiar temptations to which, at their age, they 
may be exposed ? 

It is true, generally speaking, that every age, 
as well as every state and condition of life, has 
peculiar temptations belonging to it. There are 
some sins which more easily beset the young, 
and others which more particularly assail the 



108 AFFECTIONATE INVITATION 

more advanced in years. No age, however, is 
attacked by any temptations but such as are com- 
mon to men; and all of every age are bound 
manfully to strive against temptation, in hum- 
ble reliance on the help of God, and in full con- 
fidence, — weak though they are in themselves, — 
that they can do all things through Christ 
strengthening them ; and that he will with the 
temptation also make a way to escape, so that 
they may be able to bear and to overcome it. If 
all who are exposed to temptations to sin were 
to stay away from the Lord's Supper, none could 
partake of it ; for, as I have said, all are exposed 
to some temptation or other. But this very con- 
sideration furnishes an additional argument why 
both young and old should draw near to this 
sacred rite, in order that they may receive fresh 
supplies of spiritual strength, and be the better 
enabled to contend with the manifold temptations 
that we all daily meet with. 

I apprehend that many young people stay away 
from the Lord's Supper, not because they feel that 
they have any good reason to give for their absence, 
but because they think that persons of their own 
age seldom partake of it. Let such persons re- 



TO THE HOLY COMMUNION. 109 

member, that their conduct ought to be governed 
by the will and the word of God, and not by the 
example of others, whether those others are 
many or few. Let them remember, that they 
must not follow a multitude to do evil, and 
that it is evil to disobey the dying command of 
their Saviour, and to turn their backs on the 
Lord's Table. Rather let them resolve, instead 
of following the example of others to do evil, to 
endeavour, by their own good example, to lead 
others to do well. In this instance, as in others, 
let them wish and endeavour so to let their light 
shine before men, that they may see their good 
works, and glorify their Father which is in 
heaven. 

We are all of us much the creatures of habit, 
which becomes in some sort a second nature. 
So much is this the case, that many men speak 
of any particular place, or object, or custom, as 
seeming quite natural to them, when they mean 
that they have been long accustomed or habitu- 
ated to it. Hence arises the great consequence 
of acquiring good habits, and of avoiding bad 
habits, especially in our early years. It is no- 
thing but habit that keeps many persons from 



110 AFFECTIONATE INVITATION 

partaking of the Lord's Supper. They do not 
partake of it now, because they never did partake 
of it formerly, because they have acquired the 
habit of absenting themselves. Let young per- 
sons take heed how they thus acquire a habit of 
neglecting the dying injunction of their Lord ; 
and let them endeavour in this, as in all other 
instances, to acquire the habit of ready and uni- 
form and constant obedience to the will of God. 
Let it not be supposed that I would invite or 
encourage any one to partake of this holy ordi- 
nance who is not properly prepared for it. Cer- 
tainly, no persons, whether young or old, should 
approach the Lord's table, unless they sincerely 
believe the chief articles of the Christian faith, 
and truly repent of their past sins, steadfastly 
purposing, in humble reliance on Divine grace, 
to lead a better life for the time to come. But 
such repentance and faith are necessary to the 
salvation, to the safety, of every Christian of the 
age which I have mentioned, whether he receives 
the Lord's Supper or not; and one great reason 
why I am anxious that young persons should be- 
come regular communicants, is, because I am 
anxious that they should often examine into the 



TO THE HOLY COMMUNION. HI 

sincerity both of their faith and of their repentance, 
and that their religious impressions should thus be 
rendered more strong and lively, at the same 
time that their souls are strengthened and refresh- 
ed by partaking of the body and blood of Christ. 
Let me beg you to remember, as I have just 
said, that no Christian who has arrived at the 
age of reason can hope to be saved, except he 
repent, and believe the Gospel : and that every 
one, generally speaking, who is old enough to 
repent and believe, — every one who is old enough 
to fear and to serve God, — every one that is old 
enough seriously to wish for salvation, and to 
understand the terms on which salvation is offer- 
ed, — every one that is old enough to wish and 
endeavour, in good earnest, to go to heaven 
rather than to hell — is old enough also to par- 
take of the Lord's Supper. 



THE YOUNG DISCIPLE. 

Youth, when devoted to the Lord, 

Is pleasing in his eyes ; 
A flower, though offer' d in the bud, 

Is no vain sacrifice. 

'Tis easier far if we begin 

To fear the Lord betimes ; 
For sinners who grow old in sin 

Are hardened by their crimes. 

It saves us from a thousand snares 

To mind religion young ; 
Grace will preserve our following years, 

And make our virtue strong. 

To thee, almighty God, to thee, 

Our hearts we now resign ; 
'Twill please us to look back and see 

That our whole lives were thine. 



THE 

OBJECTIONS 

WHICH ARE SOMETIMES RAISED CONCERNING 
THE 

LORD'S SUPPER. 

BY 
DANIEL WILSON, D. D., 

BISHOP OF CALCUTTA. 



Jesus said unto them, Verily, verily, I say unto 
you, Except ye eat the flesh of the Son of man, 
and drink his blood, ye have no life in you. 

Whoso eateth my flesh, and drinketh my blood, 
hath eternal life, and I will raise him up at the last 
day. 

For my flesh is meat indeed, and my blood is 

drink indeed. 

St. John, vi. 53 — 55. 



THE 

OBJECTIONS 

WHICH ARE SOMETIMES RAISED CONCERNING 
THE 

LORD'S SUPPER. 



I consider this branch of the inquiry* a& pecu- 
liarly important : and I would wish to enter 
upon it with all the tenderness and affection 
which the apprehensions of many sincere Chris- 
tians so much require. 

The difficulties on this subject are either those 
which arise in the breasts chiefly of young peo- 
ple, who are desirous, under deep impressions 
of the importance of spiritual religion, to par- 

* This tract is taken from Bishop Wilson's " Address 
to young persons previous to receiving the Lord's Sup- 
per," and forms the conclusion of that excellent work. 

Editor. 



116 AFFECTIONATE INVITATION 

take of so high a privilege ; or those which oc- 
casionally harass the minds of persons who are 
in the habit of conscientiously discharging this 
part of their duty as Christians. 

1. The difficulties which arise in the minds 
of those ivho are sincerely in earnest about re- 
ligion, on the subject of first receiving the 
Lord's Supper, may probably be excited, First, 
by the enumeration I have made of the qualifi- 
cations of those who receive the Holy Sacra- 
ment. Many may apprehend that they do not 
possess all these qualifications, or not in the de- 
gree which I have described. But let the hum- 
ble penitent know, that if he exercises these 
various dispositions and habits, as to the main 
particulars of them, though only in a weak and 
imperfect manner, he may be prepared for com- 
ing as a young but sincere disciple to the 
Table of his Saviour. If he heartily desires to 
be abased for sin, if he anxiously seeks after the 
blessings of Christ's atonement, and if willing 
to dedicate himself to the service of God, he 
may be encouraged to celebrate that Sacrament 
which is one appointed means of increasing in 
him all the graces of God's Holy Spirit. These 



TO THE HOLY COMMUNION. 117 

graces in a young person cannot be expected to 
be so advanced as in a Christian of considerable 
standing in religion ; but this want of maturity is 
so far from being a reason against partaking of 
the Holy Communion, that it is a strong argu- 
ment for joining in it. "They that are whole 
need not a physician, but they that are sick." If 
there be life, feeling, desire, solicitude, for the 
blessings of salvation, these are all that is ne- 
cessary in the first instance, in order to derive 
consolation and strength from the blessed body 
and blood of Christ. 

A similar reply may be offered, Secondly, to 
those who fear whether they are in a state of 
grace and acceptance with God. Such appre- 
hensions will long attend the best efforts of a 
young Christian. And if he is not to partake of 
the Communion till they are wholly dispelled, 
he will probably have long to wait. Some fears 
as to our character and prospects will, and even 
ought, to follow us whilst we are in a scene of 
contention and sorrow. But surely these fears 
should be controlled by the cheering promises 
and invitations of the adorable Saviour. " He 
caste th out none who come to him."* "He is 
10* 



118 AFFECTIONATE INVITATION 

able to save to the uttermost." " His blood 
cleanseth from all sin." Can the fearful inquirer 
doubt of his having some evidences of a renewed 
state of mind, when he is trembling on account 
of sin, abhorring himself, earnestly praying for 
divine grace, seeking for the way of salvation in 
Christ Jesus, and forsaking every known evil ? 
Do not his fears, his anxiety, his alarm, all bear 
testimony to the influences of God's grace in his 
heart ? Phil. ii. 12. And should the remaining 
apprehensions which alarm him keep him from 
the very Sacrament which is the seal of salva- 
tion, the earnest of forgiveness, the means of en- 
lightening and establishing his heart ? 

A third difficulty, connected with the two 
former, arises from the dread of being found 
at last to have been only hypocrites before God. 
A more fearful state than that of hypocrisy can 
scarcely be conceived. But is it very likely that 
those should be really hypocrites who are 
alarmed at the very possibility of being such 
characters ? Is it not more probable that they 
mistake the conflict of the evil passions still re- 
maining in their minds with the calls of duty and 
the leadings of grace, Rom. vii. 14, 24, for the 



TO THE HOLY COMMUNION. 119 

base pretences of the false Christian ? Nay, 
does not the anxiety which they discover of 
taking nothing for granted, of examining their 
state to the bottom, of comparing their spirit and 
conduct with the rule of God's word, of solicit- 
ing instruction from ministers and friends, of 
seizing every opportunity of ascertaining the 
real principles by which they are governed, of 
avoiding hypocrisy as a most fatal delusion, and 
of imploring the grace and Spirit of God to lead 
them into the full knowledge of themselves, suf- 
ficiently testify that they are upright in their 
hearts before God ? And should they not be 
encouraged to receive the Lord's Supper, that 
they may be enabled more steadily to resist 
every approach to dissimulation, and may bind 
themselves by stronger ties to an unreserved obe- 
dience to God ? 

Others may, Fourthly, dread the possibility 
of eating and drinking damnation unto them- 
selves, in partaking of the Lord's Supper. 
This fear has agitated many sincere minds. It 
has arisen from the language of the Apostle, 
" He that eateth and drinketh unworthily, eateth 
and drinketh damnation to himself." lCor. xi. 29. 



120 AFFECTIONATE INVITATION 

But it is evident that the Apostle did not 
here mean eternal damnation, from the explana- 
tion which he immediately adds, ver. 30, "For 
this cause many are weak and sickly among you, 
and many sleep." The temporal judgments of 
God then, as consequent upon a wilful abuse of 
the Lord's Supper, are decidedly intended. 
Accordingly, the w r ord damnation here means, 
as it is given in the margin of our Bibles, judg- 
ment, which is indeed the Apostle's own expli- 
cation, in verses 31, 32. " For if we would 
judge ourselves, we should not be judged. But 
when we are judged, we are chastened of the 
Lord, that we should not be condemned with 
the world ;" which undoubtedly means, that if 
we would examine ourselves we should not be 
punished. But when we are thus punished, we 
are chastened of the Lord, that we should not be 
condemned of the world. The apprehension 
then of eating and drinking our own eternal 
damnation has no foundation whatever in this 
passage of Holy Writ. Let not therefore any 
be terrified with the apprehension, that any pe- 
culiar punishment is annexed to our eating and 
drinking unworthily, more than may be feared 



TO THE HOLY COMMUNION. 121 

from any other offence against God. Every sin 
exposes to eternal death, and therefore this 
amongst the number ; but " he that confesseth 
and forsaketh" this, supposing him indeed to 
have committed it, as well as any other trans- 
gression, shall most undoubtedly " find mercy." 
But still, Fifthly, the dread "of eating and 
drinking unworthily'" may rest on the mind. 
If our fears on this head arise from an apprehen- 
sion that we are not in a state deserving to par- 
take of this holy Sacrament, they spring entirely 
from an erroneous sentiment. No one in this view 
is worthy of receiving so great a blessing. But 
the expression of the apostle refers to a suitable, 
fit, becoming state of mind in partaking of the 
holy Eucharist. This is evident from the inter- 
pretation which he himself gives, " He that eat- 
eth and drinketh unworthily, eateth and drinketh 
damnation unto himself, not discerning the 
Lord's body" not perceiving by faith the body 
and blood of Christ, not distinguishing between 
the consecrated elements of his body and blood 
and ordinary food, and therefore not being in a 
state of mind suitable for the sacred service. 
Nor is this use of the word uncommon. A 



122 AFFECTIONATE INVITATION 

criminal who has forfeited his life to the laws of 
his country, is wholly unworthy of the kindness 
of a benevolent visitor ; and yet if he listen to 
the admonitions of such an instructor with meek- 
ness and contrition, if he welcome the truth 
which is placed before him, and appear desirous 
to profit by it, he may properly be said to have 
received them worthily. Every notion of merit 
must be carefully excluded from our views of 
the Lord's Supper. " We are accounted right- 
eous before God only for the merit of our Lord 
Jesus Christ, and not for our own works and 
deservings." Art. XL Our worthiness for this 
Sacrament is that meetness and suitableness 
which consists in right ideas of the institution, 
humble renunciation of our own righteousness, 
earnest prayers for an interest in the atonement 
of Christ, and hearty desires to be devoted to 
his service. It is the fitness of a contrite sinner 
for receiving the memorials of the blessings of 
salvation. 

Some may be deterred from approaching the 
altar of their Saviour, Sixthly, by a fear lest 
they should not be able to keep the vows which 
they undertake. This is indeed a matter of se^ 



TO THE HOLY COMMUNION. 123 

rious consideration, and may well awaken all 
your watchfulness and activity ; but it can assu- 
redly be no reason why you should not bind 
yourself by those vows, which you are called 
upon by every motive to undertake, and which 
the grace of God can assist you to perform. If 
you were invited to make an unlawful, or unne- 
cessary, or presumptuous, or doubtful vow, you 
might properly hesitate ; but when the engage- 
ments of the Lord's Supper are merely those of 
an entire separation from sin, and a hearty reso- 
lution to obey God, you cannot with any show 
of reason decline them. An honest mind will not 
shrink from giving assurances ; especially when 
God has promised the supply of all needful 
grace to fulfil them, when the very giving them 
is a natural means of fixing our uncertain hearts 
in the service of God, and when the sacrament 
which seals our obligations is the means of con- 
veying the grace and strength for carrying them 
into effect. 

Others may be perplexed, Seventhly, With 
fears lest difficulties should present themselves 
on the part of persons with whom they are 
closely connected. We are timorous in what is 



124 AFFECTIONATE INVITATION 

good. We apprehend perhaps an opposition to 
our purposes of joining the Communion of the 
Church of Christ from those around us. The 
child, the servant, the sister, the wife, may be 
alarmed by the fear of those relatives or other 
superiors whom they are required to love and 
obey. Or they may be delaying their own par- 
ticipation of the Sacrament, under the hope of 
inducing the individuals in question to join with 
them in the solemn duty. I need not observe 
what extreme caution over our own spirit is ne- 
cessary in the discharge of any one duty, when 
it appears to militate with another. But at the 
same time we must remember that we are to 
"obey God rather than man." We may per- 
haps properly suspend for some little time the 
execution even of so good a purpose, if there be 
a reasonable prospect of uniting those, whom we 
are bound to consult on so many other occasions, 
in it. But there is great danger in such delibe- 
rations of that " fear of man which bringeth a 
snare." The words of our Redeemer must 
therefore be ever present with us. "He that 
loveth father or mother more than me, is not 
worthy of me, and he that loveth son or daughter 



TO THE HOLY COMMUNION. 125 

more than me is not worthy of me." Nor 
should we forget that we are never warranted in 
omitting a positive religious duty, by any calcu- 
lation of temporal inconveniences ; not to say in 
how many instances it may please God to bless 
our firm and open profession of his truth, to the 
spiritual benefit of the very individuals whom we 
have been so long anxious to conciliate. 

Lastly, many may be disposed to say, We 
dare not approach so awful and important a 
mystery as the Lord's Supper. An indescriba- 
ble alarm rests on some minds, especially those 
of young persons, respecting the Eucharist. A 
holy reverence should indeed always fill our 
hearts when we celebrate the most solemn of re- 
ligious duties ; yet we must beware of an over- 
whelming and therefore an excessive apprehen- 
sion. Jesus Christ is the tender and gracious shep- 
herd ; he feeds his flock with all care and affec- 
tion. He will not " break the bruised reed, nor 
quench the smoking flax." He presents himself 
in the Sacrament, not in the terrors of the Judge, 
but in the condescension and love of the Saviour. 
Why, then, should you not believe his promises, 
and trust his grace, connected as they are with 
11 



126 AFFECTIONATE INVITATION 

the most express invitation and command to cele- 
brate this feast in remembrance of Him ? You 
dare to pray, you venture to hear the word of 
God preached, you are bold enough to supplicate 
pardon and grace at the footstool of your Sa- 
viour. These duties you do not think yourselves 
justified by any excuses from neglecting. Why 
then should you dread to do that with regard to 
the Sacrament, which you constantly do as to the 
word of God and prayer? The same blessings 
are exhibited in the Lord's Supper, as you have 
already most earnestly sought. Come then, 
with composure of spirit, and supplicate that 
pardon and strength, in receiving the body and 
blood of Christ, which you have so often im- 
plored in the use of the other means of spiritual 
improvement. "Fear not; only believe." 

I pass on, Secondly, to the objections on the 
subject of the Lord's Supper which occasionally 
perplex those who are in the habit of conscien- 
tiously discharging this part of their duty as 
Christians, 

These may sometimes arise in the minds of 
Christians : First, from the idea that they have 
not found the benefit they expected from cele- 



TO THE HOLY COMMUNION. 127 

brating these holy mysteries. . This difficulty 
may possibly have been created by your expect- 
ing some impressions or effects not authorised 
by the word of God, or by your looking for 
these consequences in a manner or degree be- 
yond the real rule of Scripture. Or you may 
have mistaken an occasional depression of the 
animal spirits for desertion. Or it may be you 
have neglected the ordinary means, either pre- 
paratory to the Lord's Supper, or following 
upon it, with which God usually connects any 
important or permanent benefit. Or you have at 
some times been blessed with such elevated and 
holy emotions of heart at the Lord's Table, as 
have led you to conceive yourselves wholly des- 
titute of any advantage under more calm and 
sedate exercises of devotion. But, whatever 
may have been the particular cause of the diffi- 
culty you feel, let it never for one instant deter 
you from persevering in a regular attendance on 
the Holy Communion. The promises of God 
can never fail. Jesus Christ is the same yester- 
day, to-day, and for ever. Pray only for more 
faith, implore of God a corrected and enlarged 
judgment, wait on him for the fulfilment of his 



128 AFFECTIONATE INVITATION 

own word, look up to the blessed Saviour for his 
presence in the receiving of the consecrated me- 
morials of his love, and you shall obtain all, and 
more than all, the blessings I have mentioned ; 
you shall find that Christ's " flesh is meat in- 
deed, and his blood is drink indeed." 

Some Christians may inquire, Secondly, ivhe- 
ther they should continue to approach the Table 
of their Saviour when their consciences are bur- 
dened ivith the guilt of some particular sin. To 
this the answer is obvious, because one end of 
receiving the body and blood of Christ is to ob- 
tain the very blessings of pardon and peace of 
conscience, which the objection supposes to be 
most wanted. If, indeed, unhappily, we have 
committed some aggravated offence against God, 
and the ordinary period of our partaking of the 
Eucharist be near, it may be expedient to abstain 
for that season from the Lord's Supper : but this 
abstinence must be with the express intention of 
more humbly confessing our sins before God, 
that we may be prepared with sincere penitence 
and faith to renew the covenant we have violated, 
and apply again for that seal of pardon and re- 
conciliation which we so much need. In other 



TO THE HOLY COMMUNION. 129 

cases which may occur of our consciences being 
burdened with the remembrance of particular 
sins, our duty clearly is to renounce and forsake 
those sins with unfeigned abhorrence, and then 
to partake of the body and blood of Christ, that 
we may be strengthened in our vigorous resist- 
ance of them. 

But others may further doubt, Thirdly, whe- 
ther, when they are in a declining state of reli- 
gious feelings, they may not be committing a 
greater sin by receiving the Communion, than 
by omitting it for a time altogether. To this 
I reply, to adopt the sentiments of an able divine, 
that the omission of the Lord's Supper is itself a 
sin in a Christian who has been in the habit of 
receiving it, and a greater sin than communicating 
with whatever imperfection. It is true it is our 
duty to forbear sin, that is, all those actions which 
are sins in their own kind and nature ; but not 
those actions which may become sins by some 
accident, or the defect of some circumstances. 
In this case, the accidental evil is to be avoided, 
or the defect amended, and not the act to be 
omitted. Now receiving the Sacrament is of 
itself, and in its own nature good, and becomes 
11* 



130 AFFECTIONATE INVITATION 

sinful from some adherent corruption, which 
brings a defilement upon it. Our concern, there- 
fore, is, to aim at the removal of this defilement, 
which weakens and pollutes our act of duty, and 
not to cease from the duty itself. 

I might specify various other objections which 
may disturb the consciences of Christians with 
regard to the Holy Communion ; but I forbear, 
as those which I have answered may serve to 
suggest suitable replies in similar cases. 

It may, however, be proper here to mention, 
that objections are sometimes raised against par- 
taking of the Lord's Supper, upon grounds very 
different from any of those which I have as yet 
adverted to. The cases I have considered are 
those of persons sincerely in earnest about spiri- 
tual religion. But objections are also made by 
those who betray, by the very nature of them, a 
totally wrong state of mind. Many persons, 
when invited to prepare for this important duty, 
will at once admit that they are not in a fit 
state for performing it, and yet will remain 
for years apparently quite unconcerned about 
that entire change of heart and character, 
which they are aware is necessary to their 



TO THE HOLY COMMUNION. 131 

rightly receiving the Lord's Supper. Others 
will meet every exhortation addressed to them 
on the subject, by replying, that they are not 
prepared to make that separation from the 
amusements and pursuits of the world to 
which the Sacrament would bind them. It is 
not uncommon, moreover, to hear it affirmed by 
some, that they do not consider the duty so 
essential to salvation as we endeavour to repre- 
sent it : whilst too many imagine that the hurry 
and engagements of their families is an ade- 
quate reason for declining a compliance with our 
Saviour's command. Others likewise, though 
living in the commission of known sin, will 
satisfy themselves in continuing it, by the 
wretched pretence that they do not receive the 
Holy Communion. Many, lastly, either defer 
attending to the subject, under the distant and 
slender hope of becoming better and more fit for 
celebrating the Eucharist hereafter ; or rashly 
and superstitiously suppose, that receiving the 
Communion on a dying bed will be some se- 
curity for the admission of their souls into the 
happiness of heaven. 

To these, and various like statements, one 



132 AFFECTIONATE INVITATION 

answer must be given. They all proceed from 
minds fixed on the love and practice of sin, and 
unawakened to a proper feeling of the nature and 
importance of religion. The duty of all such 
objectors is twofold : first, to repent and believe 
the Gospel; and, secondly, thus repenting and 
believing, to prepare for celebrating, in an hum- 
ble and spiritual manner, the most blessed mys- 
teries of the body and blood of Christ. A merely 
external participation of the Sacrament, in a for- 
mal, ignorant, and superstitious state of mind, 
can indeed only increase the guilt of those who 
so profane the Redeemer's holy institution. No 
one is to be encouraged to such a profanation. 
Those who, with the objectors before us, con- 
sider their religious duties as in some way me- 
ritorious before God, and regard the Sacrament 
as a finish to their other performances, are funda- 
mentally wrong. They must be directed to fer- 
vent prayer to God, for spiritual illumination, for 
contrition of heart for sin ; for real faith in the 
sacrifice of the death of Christ, for a new spirit 
and a right conduct. Till they have thus entered 
in earnest on the duties of religion generally, in 
vain will they inquire as to the particular duty 



TO THE HOLY COMMUNION. 133 

of receiving the Lord's Supper. They must 
become in some measure true Christians be- 
fore they can celebrate the Christian's most 
sacred festival. They must learn to know, and 
value, and love the Saviour, before they can ap- 
proach his table. They must have spiritual life, 
before they can offer up spiritual sacrifices. 

But this leads me to consider, in the last 
place, 

The Obligations we are under to a regular 
partaking of the LorcVs Supper. 

I need say less on this topic after the various 
points which I have already considered, because 
every thing which has been offered with respect 
to the Institution of the Sacrament, the Design 
of it, and the Blessings to be derived from it, im- 
mediately tends to enforce the obligation under 
which we lie to a constant receiving of it. It 
may be sufficient to notice that the obligation 
rests, 

1 . On the express command of our Saviour 
Christ. His words were, " Do this in remem- 
brance of me ;" words delivered when he was 
about to undergo the most bitter anguish of his 



134 AFFECTIONATE INVITATION 

passion, and which therefore should move the 
love, as well as ensure the obedience, of those 
who profess to be his disciples. The command 
is besides the more obligatory, as it rests on the 
ground not of ^natural duty, but of positive insti- 
tution ; and accordingly the observation of it is a 
more direct acknowledgment of the authority of 
Christ, and the neglect of it is more immediately 
connected with a marked contempt of his power 
and grace. Add to this, that it was the last 
mandate of a dying friend, and that friend our 
Redeemer and Lord ; circumstances which, even 
in ordinary cases of human affection, give a 
sanctity to an injunction, and which should 
much more do so with respect to the blessed 
Saviour of our souls. The command also is 
one which the Apostle Paul has largely enforced 
and explained far beyond any other similar topic, 
a fact which evidently shows the high import- 
ance we should attach to the institution. The 
simplicity of the rite, in opposition to the bur- 
densome ceremonies of the Mosaic Law, whilst 
it increases the facility of complying with the 
duty, augments its obligation. To all which, 



TO THE HOLY COMMUNION. 135 

when we further subjoin that the Christian 
Church has in every age fulfilled this their 
Lord's command, and has thus given all the 
encouragement of prescription and example to 
the conscientious performance of the duty, it 
will appear, I think, beyond all dispute, that it 
is indispensably binding on every Christian. 

But the obligation to this duty is not less ap- 
parent if we take into view, 

2. The benefit of our own souls. Every 
motive to be derived from the value of the soul 
of man, and the importance of spiritual religion 
for his present and future happiness, is united 
in the case of this blessed Sacrament. The due 
and humble participation of it brings with it un- 
speakable blessings ; the omission of it, where 
it is wilful, is inconsistent with a state of grace 
and acceptance with God. All the obligation, 
then, that can rest on an accountable being to 
consult his highest interests, and on a sinner 
under a dispensation of grace to avail himself of 
the offers of Divine mercy, enforces the neces- 
sity of partaking of that Sacrament which is the 
seal and bond of all the blessings of salvation, 



136 AFFECTIONATE INVITATION 

and is the means of conveying to us strength and 
support here, and preserving us to everlasting 
life hereafter. 

Sincerely therefore would I hope that all into 
whose hands this Address may fall, will be con- 
vinced of the obligation under which they lie 
to partake in a suitable manner of the Lord's 
Supper. 

It remains only that, to promote this end still 
further, I enforce, in conclusion, the obligation I 
have explained. 

I. On those who may be living in sin and 
negligence of religion, for the purpose of ex- 
horting them to repent and to turn to God. 
Let such remember, that whilst they are unfit 
for the Holy Communion, as at present they 
undoubtedly are, they are equally unfit to die, 
and appear before God in judgment. Let them 
call to mind that the same state of heart which 
would lead them to living faith in the Son of 
God, would prepare them for celebrating the 
memorials of his death. Their continuance, 
then, in habits of sin brings on them, not only 
the immediate guilt of the acts of provocation 
which they commit against God, but also that 



TO THE HOLY COMMUNION. 137 

mediate and remote criminality which is con- 
nected with their renouncing virtually their holy 
profession, disallowing the dedication made of 
them to God in baptism, and remaining unfit to 
celebrate those mysteries of religion, which are 
absolutely essential to the name of a sincere 
Christian. Every one, in fact, who was in 
infancy admitted to the Sacrament of Baptism, 
and there devoted to the love and service of God 
the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost, and 
who, being now arrived at years of discretion, 
lives in a course of life which incapacitates 
him for participating aright in the Communion 
of Jesus Christ, does virtually " trample under 
foot the Son of God, counts the blood of the 
Covenant wherewith he was sanctified an un- 
holy thing, and does despite to the Spirit of 
grace." The fearful state of such a person I 
need not describe. When he leaves the temple 
of God where the mysteries of Christ are about 
to be celebrated, he turns away from " Him that 
speaketh from Heaven ;" he declares that 46 he 
has no part nor lot in the matter," "he judges 
himself unworthy of eternal life." Let me af- 
fectionately call on such to consider their ways, 
12 



138 AFFECTIONATE INVITATION 

to hear the voice of mercy, to yield themselves 
unto God, and to submit to the sceptre of Christ. 
Then will the Church welcome them to this 
Holy Supper ; then will the Saviour feed them 
with his precious body and blood; then shall 
they know the blessedness and peace which 
spring from pardon and acceptance with God, 
and the strength and consolation which are de- 
rived from that Sacrament which is the means 
of building them up to eternal life. 

II. Allow me next to press the obligation of 
receiving the Holy Eucharist on those who are 
hesitating as to the course they should pursue. 
You have been devoted to God in the Sacrament 
of Baptism ; you have been blessed perhaps with 
much religious instruction ; you have some good 
impressions on your mind towards God ; your 
lives and conduct are amiable and respectable ; 
but yet you delay the time of publicly devoting 
yourselves to Christ at his holy institution ; you 
" halt between two opinions." Oh ! let me be- 
seech you to "choose this day whom you will 
serve." Let me urge on your consciences the 
duty of deciding for God. Let me remind you, 
that the nearer you seem to Heaven, if at last 



TO THE HOLY COMMUNION. 139 

you should fall short of it, the more lamentable 
will be the event. Let me tell you, that he that 
is " not with Christ is against him, and he that 
gathereth not with him, scattereth abroad." Oh ! 
"remember now your Creator in the days of 
your youth ; enter seriously on the consideration 
of the Lord's Supper; implore fervently the 
grace you require for partaking of it in a suitable 
state of mind ; seal your covenant with God ; 
confess your Saviour publicly before men ; join 
yourselves fully to his mystical body ; and doubt 
not of receiving your Saviour's grace at his 
Table to enable you to fulfil your vows. Thus 
shall you look back in future life on the season 
when you first approached the Holy Commu- 
nion, as a time ever to be recorded with devout 
thankfulness to the God of your salvation." 

Lastly, Let me urge the obligation of receiv- 
ing the Lord's Supper on those who are in the 
habit of performing this duty, with the view of 
exhorting them to a more regular and consci- 
entious discharge of it. Too many are defec- 
tive in these respects. Let me invite such to 
entertain an increasing esteem of this institution, 
and never to rest satisfied without receiving 



140 AFFECTIONATE INVITATION, ETC. 

some distinct, and practical, and abiding advan- 
tage from it. Let no opportunity of joining in 
this celebration be willingly omitted. Rather 
look forward with anticipation and joy to the 
seasons as they approach. Cultivate that high 
value and love for it, which will always bear 
some proportion to your love to the Saviour who 
instituted the Sacrament, and who never ceases 
to bless it. Be diligent in seeking the presence 
and grace of God in your preparation for it, as 
well as in the discharge of the duties to which, 
from time to time, it binds you. And may God 
grant that the writer of these lines, and the 
readers of them, may ever continue united to 
the mystical body of Christ, may be nourished 
in the union of that body by the most precious 
food provided at the Supper of the Lord our 
Redeemer, and may be so strengthened and 
nourished by that and the other means of grace, 
that they may be preserved, by the power and 
mercy of their Saviour and the influence of 
his Spirit, through the various temptations of 
this life, till at length they attain to everlasting 
salvation. 



BISHOP IIDDLETON, 



It is a subject of deep regret that so many 
are found to excuse themselves from the Table 
of their Redeemer. Some are unfit to appear 
there, as perhaps they themselves allege; and 
while they lay great stress upon the sin of re- 
ceiving the Sacrament unworthily, forget that 
they are guilty of the greater sin of not re- 
nouncing the course of life in which alone their 
unworthiness consists ; while others seem to 
consider this Sacrament as something which is 
left to their option, whether they will receive it 
or reject it : and yet our Church has pronounced, 
that both the sacraments are " generally necessa- 
ry to salvation," meaning no doubt, where they 
may be had. Both, indeed, are intimately con- 
nected with the great object of the Gospel dis- 
pensation, " the remission of sins." It was for 
this end that St. Peter called upon the people to 
be baptized (Acts, ii. 38) ; and our Saviour, 
when at the institution of the other Sacrament, 



142 

He gave the cup to his disciples, declared 
it to be his "blood of the New Testament, 
which is shed for many, for the remission of sins;" 
(Matt. xxvi. 28) ; and it is hardly possible to 
understand otherwise than in relation to the same 
Sacrament, though not then instituted, that most 
awful saying of our Saviour, " Verily, verily, I 
say unto you, Except ye eat the flesh of the Son 
of Man, and drink his blood, ye have no life in 
you." (John, vi. 53.) It must not, indeed, be 
taken to mean the mere act of eating and drink- 
ing the sacred elements, but the spiritual use and 
application of it ; in which, however, the act is 
supposed. But independently of these conside- 
rations, it may be enough for you to know, that 
this Sacrament was ordained by Christ himself, 
as a standing memorial of the one Great Sacri- 
fice for sin. It cannot, therefore, be innocent, or 
even a matter of little moment, that any man shall 
deliberately refuse to bear testimony to the merits 
and efficacy of that Sacrifice, in the manner 
prescribed. It is, in truth, however it may be 
meant, little less than a denial of the Lord that 
bought him. (2 Peter, ii. 1.) 



BISHOP BEVERIDGE. 



We have only one Saviour in the world, and 
He hath instituted only one Sacrament to put us 
always in mind of Him ; and yet that people, 
that Christians, should slight that ! what shall I 
say? I know not how to express their folly 
and ingratitude, much less the dismal conse- 
quences of it. But how to remedy it, I know 
not. I have done what I could ; I have taken 
all occasions to convince you of your sin and 
danger in neglecting this blessed Sacrament, and 
to persuade you to a more frequent receiving of 
it; but I see nothing will do, indeed nothing can 
do it, but the almighty power of God, whom I 
therefore beseech, of His infinite mercy, to open 
men's eyes, that they may see the things that 
belong to their everlasting peace, before they be 
hid from them. And then, I am sure, this 
Sacrament would be as much frequented as it 
hath been hitherto neglected. 

Wherefore, my brethren, you had need look 



144 

about you. Christ, your Saviour, hath expressly 
commanded you often to receive this Sacrament 
of His body and blood in remembrance of Him. 
And therefore, you, who never yet received it, 
have lived all this while in the wilful breach of a 
known law ; and, by consequence, in a wilful 
and known sin : and you who receive it but sel- 
dom, do not fully obey or come up to the law, 
which plainly requires you to do it often. 



THE END. 



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